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FIRST 







IjM Tsur 



With ILLUSTRATIONS 







33nrtfnrh: 



F . A . BROWN 

1853. 



HARTFORD 

U THE OLDEN TIME 
$fs $tnst ®|irfi| Hears. 

( Isaac William S^axt^ 
v. i\ 

EDITED BY W. M. B. HARTLEY. 

E3ttJ) Illustrations. 



HARTFORD: 
PUBLISHED BY F. A. BROWN. 

1853. 



Flo 4- 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1853, by 

F. A. BROWN, 
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Connecticut. 






PRESS OP CAS1, TIFFANY AND COMPANY, HARTFORD. 



£ft£Eae-I. 



Reader. Perhaps you wonder with uplifted hands that Sc.eva 
has taken to himself an Editor, and even may curl your lip when 
told, that one unknown to fame has ventured to obtrude his own 
name. But Sc^EVA is a quaint old man, and 'tis his humor. It is 
but now that he consents to appear before you in another garb, al- 
though warmly urged to do so by very many who wish to preserve 
his writings in a compact form. A voice from home, for instance, 
through the columns of the Hartford Courant, thus pleasantly ap- 
peals to him : 



So t\)t historian of ^artforlj. 

Thanks, Sceva, thanks ! 

How many a brightening eye 
Hath by thy tube transpierc'd the mists of time, 
And marked their forms, who first upon the banks 
Of this fair river rear'd their rude abodes, 
Sharing the hardships of colonial life. 
Forth at thy graphic touch they come, to keep 
Stern watch and ward against the Indian bow — 
Ploughing the furrow for their children's bread, 
And planting roots of knowledge that should feed 
The mind, thro' unborn ages. 

Thou hast drawn 
From mouldering archives, pictur'd lineaments 
Of patient toil, and unrepining trust ; 
And from the moss-grown sepulchre, restor'd 
Names that their race should honour. 

Peacefully 
Beneath the shadow of their trees we walk, 
And listen for their words. 



PREFACE. 

Thanks, Soxva, thanks ! 
But not farewell — for we have much to learn, 
And thou must aid us, from thy castled heighth, 
Fast by the Charter Oak, to guard with care 
The patriot lore of the Recorded Past. 

Hartford, Feb. 19th, 1852. 



L. H. S. 



A voice from the mountains, whose form is prose, but whose tones 
are poetry, is also heard : 

To the Editor of the Courant. 

Dr.AU Sir: — I do not suppose that the author of those 
articles subscribed Sc.eva, that have from time to time appeared in your columns, could 
feel complimented by any testimonial from nic : but I am so delighted with bis con- 
tributions that 1 cannot forbear adding my solicitations to those of many more, that 
he will continue to Matter those beautiful flowers of which he has such inexhaustible 
stores, along the dusty road of our Colonial history. 

That valley with its little community meeting beneath the shadow of the hills, how 
it wakens into life at the touch of the enchanter! Those grim old Fathers of Con- 
necticut, with their school?, their sumptuary laws, their Train Bands, their wars, their 
piety, their exchisiveiicss, their dread of the Devil and their horror of Dutchmen and 
-. how their faces brighten, how their brows relax, as they peep out from the 
mirror held up to them by their graceful descendant. Their very steeple-crowned hats 
seem to smile upon Scjeva . 

Have we indeed read the l<ist number of those charming sketches, not so much of 
men as of manners, not so much of manners as of an era which gave birth to all 
republican States that acknowledge as their basis true Christian liberty ? 

And if we have rea shall even the few that have already delighted us, lie 

scattered as they fell, like the leaves in Autumn, to be tost by the winds till they are 
lost in oblivion, so that not even the hand that gave them form and life can restore 
them to the eyes of those who have already had such pleasant glimpses of their 
beaut}', or treasure them up for the admiration of the future ? 

Will you not, Mr. Editor, entreat Scsva to gather them up, bind them in a volume 
worthy to embalm them, ami commit them as the Konian Poet did his little book, to 
the care of posterity ? 

For Scsva is a poet, a pastoral, an epic, a didactic, a dramatic poet, though he writes 
in what the world calls prose. What a pity all the world does not know as Cicero did, 
that prose as well as verse has its numbers. 

Your obedient servant, 

LiTCHFraLD, March 6, 1852. G. H. H. 

Sceva could not resist these kind appeals, and he gives you now, 
in a " volume worthy," he hopes, "to embalm them," his chronicles of 
the early life of Hartford. He shows you a wild but beauteous wood- 



PREFACE. O 

land, rescued from painted savages and savage beasts that once ranged, 
as we do now, o'er its free hills, or floated down the stream of that 
glad river which still laves its shore. He tells you of the struggles 
and disheartening toils of the early settlers — ancestors, perhaps, of 
those who read — of their hopes, their joys, their fears and sorrows 
too, of all that remains to us of those " good, honest, true and honor- 
able men." 

Few marble tablets, urns, or stones, 

Tell where repose their honored bones ; 

The tide of time, and dull di 

Have swept their tenements awj 

But not their names. These live as yet, 

In hearts that never can forget. 



The battle of life, as fought by the Pilgrim Fathers, is not to be 
despised. If it teaches but the virtue of self-denial, it is not lost ; 
and should it do more — should it stimulate the young to action, the 
more advanced to lives in harmony with those of parents in the olden 
time, and all to grave and earnest preparation for the future, the 
chronicles of Sc^eva will not have been written in vain. They are 
published nearly as they were given to the Public, number after 
number, in the columns of the Hartford Daily Courant — after care- 
ful revision, however, by their author, but with a preservation, in 
the main, of those allusions to present times which served so well as 
a condiment to the articles on their first appearance. While thus 
their pristine dress of thought has been retained, the Editor, upon 
the suggestion of the author and other friends, has added a few pic- 
torial- illustrations. 

That the volume, in its present shape, may abundantly gratify and 
instruct all who read it, is the fervent wish both of Sc.eva and him- 
self. 

W. M. B. H. 

Hautford, January, 1853. 



CaMf cf Cfltttettta. 



HARTFORD. 

No. 1. Its Beginning 9 

No. 2. Its First Appearance to the Settlers 17 

No. 3. Its Purchase. Its Distribution and Plan 25 

No. 4. Black Governors in Connecticut — By way of note to "Hartford, No. 3." 37 

No. 5. Map of the Town in 1640 45 

No. 6. Its First Organization— Civn, and Religious 49 

No. 7. Its First Military Organization 63 

No. 8. Its First Burying-Ground 75 

No. 9. Its Name. A Coat of Arms 83 

No. 10. Its Municipal Organization — down to 1G50 99 

No. 11. Its Judicial Organization — down to 1650 107 

No. 12. Its Military History — down to 1650 113 

No. 13. Its Land Policy— down to 1650 125 

No. 14. Its Sumptuary Policy — down to 1650 131 

No. 15. Its Agriculture — down to 1650 141 

No. 16. Its Trades and Commerce — down to 1650 153 

No. 17. The School— the Church — the Grate— down to 1650 161 

No. 18. Its Chief Functionaries — down to 1650 175 

No. 19. Its Civil History — from 1650 to 1665. Period Second 185 

No. 20. Its Civil History continued. Period Second 195 

No. 21. Its Mills— Its Inns. Period Second 207 ~~ 

No. 22. Its Ecclesiastical History. Pfriod Second 221 

No. 23. Code of 1650. Peculiar Laws. Punishments. Period Second. . . . 233 

No. 24. Dutch Point. Its History. Periods First and Second 243 

No. 25. The Muse again at Dutch Point 273 

No. 26. The Militart History of Hartford. The Indians. Period Second. . 277 

No. 27. Marriages and Births. Period Second 285 

No. 28. Deaths between 1650 and 1665. Kev. S. Stone. Gov. Haynes. Gov. 

Hopkins. Period Second • . . . . 295 

No. 29. The School. Reflections. Good-Bye. Period Second 307 



artforlr- 



ITS BEGINNING. 

No. 1. 

" Prithee, Winthrop, please to let me know, 

By whom it was your place did first commence?" 

Roger Wolcott. 

" Sires, dames and little ones, the unflinching band 
Thrid the deep forest, climb the weary hill ; 

A wandering Israel seeks the promised land, 
And God sustains his chosen people still." Anon. 

It was 1631, two hundred and twenty -two years 
ago, what part of the year we know not, and Governor 
Winslow of Plymouth visited Connecticut. His was 
probably the foot of the first white man upon its soil. 
It was 1631 and 1632, when subsequent explorers and 
traders, also from Plymouth, sailed up and down its 
Great River, bearing back with them hemp, furs and 
deer skins. It was 1633 when William Holmes, near 
the mouth of the Tunxis River in Windsor, erected for 
purposes of trade, the first framed house in Connect- 
icut. It was 1634 and 1635, when a few bands, some 
of men alone, some of men, women and children, and 
one of about sixty in number, settled along from 
Windsor to the southern limit of Wethersfield. But 
cold and famine did their work upon them. They 

were soon, most of them, destroyed or driven back. 
2 



10 



HARTFORD. 



The country thus visited, however, became known as 
exceedingly fertile, the Indians as friendly, trade with 
them as lucrative. The opportunity for permanent 
settlement was most inviting. Influenced by these 
considerations, by straitened accommodations in Mass- 
achusetts, by the necessity of better support both for 
themselves and those who were to follow them from 
England, and by the motive of keeping the Dutch from 
possessing a fruitful and important part of New En- 
gland, it was in June, 1636, that the Rev. Thomas 
Hooker, Mr. Samuel Stone, and about an hundred 
others, men, women and children, took their way from 
Cambridge, near Boston, to the present site of Hart- 
ford. 

What was this band, how composed, that thus ven- 
tured through the wilderness to found a Town, and aid 
to found a State ? One of exiles from their father-land 
for faith and liberty — a band of serious, hardy, enter- 
prising, hopeful settlers, ready and determined to carve 
out, for themselves and their posterity, new and happy 
homes in a wilderness — there to sink the foundations 
for a chosen Israel — there to till, create, replenish, 
extend trade, spread the gospel, spread civilization, 
spread liberty — there to live, act, die and dig quiet 
sepulchres, in a hope and happiness that were destined 
to spring, phoenix-like, from the ashes of one genera- 
tion to illumine and beautify the generation which was 
to succeed. At the head of this band stood Hooker. 
Wise, learned, well versed in civil as well as in religious 
affairs, earnest, fearless, quick in composition, ready 
in debate — skilled in human nature — a rare soother of 
consciences — a " son of consolation" to the afflicted, a 



ITS BEGINNING, 



11 



" son of thunder" in rebuking sin — ready while doing 
his Master's work, as was quaintly said, "to put a 
king in his pocket" — a Bunyan's Great-heart to Zion's 
pilgrims — a moral Boone to pilgrims of this world — 
he was just the man to inspire and conduct an emigra- 
tion like that under consideration. Associated with 
him in the enterprise, though not in his journey through 
the wilderness, were John Haynes and Thomas Welles — 
the first already a Governor in Massachusetts, and each 
subsequently Governors of Connecticut — men rich in 
experience, and eminent alike for their prudence, piety, 
skill and private worth. Associated with him soon 
after the commencement of his enterprise, but fairly 
embraced within it, were George Wyllys and Edward 
Hopkins, also Governors subsequently of Connecticut — 
remarkable, the first for his agricultural, the second for 
his mercantile enterprise — each signalized afterwards 
by an intelligent administration of public affairs, by 
great personal worth, and by energy in throwing out 
from the primitive nursery, when formed at Hartford, 
shoots upon which infant settlements in the adjoining 
country might climb into townships, and affiliate with 
a new republic. And immediately of Hooker's party, 
and his associate as teacher in the Church, was Samuel 
Stone — a theological Socrates — a subtle reasoner and 
great disputant — ingenious, witty, didactic — remark- 
able for his frequent fastings and exact Sabbaths — " a 
man of principles, and in the management of those 
principles," says Mather, both a Load-stone and a Flint- 
stone" And there was William Goodwin, ruling Elder 
in the Church, of uncompromising faith, upright in 
conduct, of tireless enterprise, pioneer in negotiations 



12 HARTFORD. 

with the Indians, of wealth and great influence — and 
Matthew Allyn, and William Whiting, and John Tal- 
cott, and John Webster, and Richard Lord, and John 
Steele, and John Oullick, and John Pratt, and Thomas 
Standley, and Edward Stebbins, and William West- 
ivood, all men of note and prominent influence both in 
ecclesiastical and civil affairs, with more than ordinary 
possessions for the day, and honored often in after times 
with offices of high trust. The rest of the party were 
men, chiefly planters, a very few mechanics, several 
merchants — members, most of them, of Mr. Hooker's 
congregation at Cambridge — known to the chnreh for 
lives upright and godly, and to society for industry, 
energy, usefulness and respectability. There was 
probably not a single bad man in all Mr. Hooker's 
"goodly company" — and as for the women — why it is 
not always that a good man has a good wife or good 
children — things sometimes "go by contraries" — but it 
is a fair inference that wives and daughters who went 
chiefly church members, and the companions of such 
men as we have described, and who were willing to 
risk their all for a perilous life in a wilderness, were pure 
in their purposes, and blameless and energetic in their 
conduct. 

Such was the band that started from Cambridge, 
near Boston, to found Hartford. Where will you find 
another its superior in mind, knowledge, character, 
purpose ? No where. How rarely will you find one 
its equal in these respects ! Well may the citizens of 
Hartford be proud of their progenitors — no Goths 
starting from wild lairs to overrun and devastate peo- 
pled towns and cities — no Tartars to steal the crown 



ITS BEGINNING. 13 

of any already existing little empire — no Crusaders in 
the pomp and panoply of earthly might to rescue any 
worthless Jerusalem — no band of mere trappers and 
miners, absorbed in thought of peltry and gold — no 
pioneers for the mere glory of opening new settlements 
and adding to the halo of dominion — but a company 
of sober, intelligent, wise, earnest, resolute lovers of 
God and lovers of man, going forth, freighted with the 
rich elements of church and state, to scatter them 
there where a wilderness might be made " to bud and 
blossom as the rose!" 

It was a morning in June, 1636 — bright and early we 
may safely suppose — that this company was collected 
in Cambridge, to begin its journey — men, women and 
children, over an hundred, with packs or bundles, 
most of them, borne on the back or by the hand, and 
near them a few wagons and carts hitched to horses 
or oxen, and around an hundred and sixty head of cat- 
tle, and swine and goats and kids. The wagons and 
carts were loaded, heavily no doubt, for ample time 
had been given for preparation, and uncertainty as to 
the transmission of effects by sea, and the necessity in 
their plan of speedy recourse to them, must, we think, 
have induced the Emigrants to carry with them all 
that they could, at least in the way of house, and 
kitchen, and yard, and farming utensils. Would you 
get an idea of their equipment ? Just glance, then, 
over the note below.* 



* For mechanical purposes they had axes broad and narrow, adzes, hatch- 
ets, chisels, wimbles, augers, gimlets, files, saws, wedges, beetle rings, and 
numerous pieces and scraps of iron ; for house furniture, a few forms and 
stools, cushions, tablecloths, napkins, towels, cups, saucers, porringers and 



14 HARTFORD. 

A goodly provision, it would seem ! Yes, for that 
day, and under the circumstances of the party, start- 
ing as it was upon an expedition not expected to occupy 
more than five or six days. Yet not more, nor half so 
much proportionally, as you may see now, every day, 
among multitudes who are threading the thousand de- 
vious arms of the Mississippi, or making their way to 
new homes in California or Oregon — nor a provision 
half so rich in convenience, utility and variety, as that 
which fills up, daily, the long canvass-covered wagons 
of our emigrants to the West. Such is progress ! 

But the Hartford settlers were doomed in one re- 
spect to disappointment. The journey they expected 
to make in five or six days occupied them a full fort- 
night. Think of making the same journey now, 
Hartford citizen, in four hours ! No record remains of 
t heir progress. "We know, however, that it was through 
a pathless wilderness, the abode of wild beasts, and 
savages more wild than these. No roads, no fences, 
no bridges — mountains, ravines, swamps, thickets — the 
felling of trees, the filling up of hollows, the clipping 



candlesticks, both of wood and of pewter, feather beds, flock beds, bolsters, 
pillows, sheets of flax or hemp, coverlids, blankets, curtains, curtain rods, 
knives, spoons, dishes chiefly of wood or pewter, and a few mirrors. For 
the kitchen they had pots and kettles both of brass and iron, pans for baking, 
warming and frying, skimmers, skillets, ladles, pestles, mortars, cansticks, 
cullenders, chafing dishes, bottles of pewter, of leather and of glass, cob 
irons, gridirons, smoothing irons, trammels, and pot hooks, and spits, wooden 
and pewter platters, tongs, shovels, andirons, pails, firkins, brewing vessels, 
bowls, tunnels, drinking horns, &c. For yard and farming purposes they 
had plowshares and colters, scythes, hoes, spades, mattocks, cleavers, sad- 
dles, ropes, collars, harnesses, bridles, halters, &c. Besides these articles, 
they had pieces of cloth, linen and woolen, wearing apparel, paper, some 
bundles of leather, provisions for the way, beside the milk of cows, of com, 
wheat, pease, oats, butter, cheese, &c, and arms and ammunition. 



ITS BEGINNING. 15 

of banks, the removal of rocks, the construction of 
rafts, the swimming of cattle — the bivouac on the hill, 
in the valley, amid the thatch of the meadow or the 
underbrush of the wood — the dark, eternal forest, the 
howl of the wolf, the snarl of the bear, the cry of the 
panther, the hiss of the snake, the prowl of the Indian — 
these are the associations which paint but too truly 
the difficulty and the danger the Emigrants underwent. 
They had no guide but the compass, no cover but the 
heavens. The sun their illuminator by day, the flare 
of their camp fires was their only light by night. The 
gun, the pistol, the sword, were almost constantly in 
their hands — for game and for defence against danger. 
And so on they came, the weary riding in wagons, 
the sick, as was Mrs. Hooker, borne on litters, the 
rest trudging resolutely on foot — on they came, these 
pioneers of the olden time — vocalizing the woods with 
the triple melody of their voices and axes and guns — 
the turf literally their " fragrant shrine," God's " arch" 
literally their " temple" — till about the middle of the 
soft, leafy month of June, they stood on the banks of 
that river, 

" the sweetest of the chain 



That links the mountain to the mighty main," 

the fair, the noble, the glorious Connecticut ! 

Where did they strike this river ? Perhaps high up 
as Springfield, for Hutchinson mentions the Chicopee 
River as one which on their route they could not well 
avoid — perhaps between Springfield and Hartford — 
perhaps lower down. But no matter — here they are, 
thank God, at last, on the site of Hartford, tired, 



16 HARTFORD. 

safe, thankful, hopeful, at their journey's end ! Hark 
to their voice of prayer, to their songs of thanksgiv- 
ing! 

How do things appear to them? "We will look 
through their eyes, Reader, in another article. 

Sc&va. 



arif artr. 



ITS FIRST APPEARANCE TO THE SETTLERS. 

No. 2. 

" Thy parent stream, fair Hartford, met the eye, 
Far lessening upward to the northern sky ; 
No watery glades thro' richer valleys shine, 
Nor drinks the sea a lovelier wave than thine." 

Joel Barlow. 

Conceive Connecticut River, Reader, in front of our 
city, running much farther east than at present, and re- 
ceiving the tributary North Meadow Creek at the foot 
of our present Ferry Street continued east. Stretch- 
ing from its banks on either side, but sloping soon 
into uplands on the west, behold level, extensive mead- 
ows, as now, but which here and there are to quite an 
extent wooded and covered with underbrush. Fire, 
however, at frequent intervals, has consumed trees, 
bushes and foliage. It was the Indian's remorseless 
agent for clearing land, that it might look upon the 
sun, and forget its deep, cold gloom. Large spaces 
appear wholly destitute of timber and covered with a 
long, wiry grass, the primitive thatch, or, if without 
grass, are undulated by rows of Indian hillocks, the 
beds of corn and hemp and squashes. To the west 
and north are several uplands, one main one on the 
present site of our city, cleared also like the meadows 
by fire, but locked in on most sides by the tall, green 



18 



HARTFORD, 



trees of a primeval forest, which now rising, now sink- 
ing, bnt never with any great elevation or depression, 
stretches miles away east and west, till it climbs and 
overruns two long ranges of mountains. The pine, 
the cedar, the oak, the maple, the walnut, the bass- 
wood, the whitewood, the ash, the elm, the beech, 
figure conspicuously in this perspective, while beneath 
climb and thicken, in great profusion, the vines of the 
wild grape, the raspberry and blackberry, and the 
bushes of the currant, and of the bay and dew and 
whortle and straw berries, and the small trees of the 
wild cherry and plum. And here and there scattered 
in open spaces on the banks of the Great River, and 
along the Little River, here and there beneath tall and 
majestic trees, or on little cleared elevations in differ- 
ent parts of our present city, the smoke rises from 
numerous Indian wigwams. It rises, dense as the 
fumes from their pipe bowls, plainly from the fort of 
the Dutchmen at the Point, and now and then from 
the solitary hut of some resolute Englishman, rem- 
nant of former emigrations, who in spite of cold and 
famine and disease, still maintains his foothold in the 
wilderness. It is June — the middle of it. Trees, 
plants and shrubs are all in foliage. Corn and hemp 
in much abundance have started from the ground. 
The earth has on its carpet of green. Birds carol 
every where amid verdant branches. The sturgeon 
and the salmon have not yet ceased to leap in the 
river. The Indian is busy spearing them, or dragging 
his hempen net "by mossy bank and darkly waving 
wood." His tiny canoe is shooting up and down a 
stream — broad, deep and majestic enough it looks, to 



ITS FIRST APPEARANCE. 19 

float all the pinnaces that commerce can gather, on, 
freighted with every exchangeable commodity that 
industry can create, on to the ocean and a market. 

Such was the first aspect of Hartford to the primi- 
tive Settlers. Truly it was a goodly one ! 

A more minute view but improved it. It showed 
that the soil was indeed, as reported, naturally most 
fruitful — that it produced a remarkable variety of 
most valuable roots and herbs — and that the groves 
around were filled with natural fruits and excellent 
game, and the waters with fish. Ground-nuts, arti- 
chokes, wild leeks, onions, garlic, turnips, wild pease, 
plantain, radishes, and other esculent roots, grew 
spontaneously. There was hardly a medicinal vege- 
table, of common use, that could not be found in 
profusion. There was enough of bloodroot, and liq- 
uorice root, and spikenard, and elecampane, and sarsa- 
parilla, and senna, and ginseng, and angelica, and 
masterwort, and lungwort, and centaury, and flag, 
and elder, and pennyroyal, and rattlesnake weed, and 
mallow, and celandine — enough of these, and of 
many other medicinal roots and barks and buds, to 
supply scores of druggists and cullers of simples for 
centuries. Walnuts, chestnuts, butternuts, hazelnuts 
and acorns, filled the groves. What a time the chil- 
dren were to have ! Wild game was also to be found 
in the richest abundance. There were the deer, moose, 
bear, turkey, partridge, quail, and pigeons in such 
extraordinary numbers as frequently " to obscure the 
light" as they swept in flocks along. And there were 
water-fowl, too, in great variety — the wild goose, the 
wild duck, the widgeon, the broadbill, the teal. How 



20 



HARTFORD, 



appetizing! What a lure to deglutition and diges- 
tion! One would think the Hartford Settlers need 
never have thought of being troubled with " anxious 
stomachs," there was around them a natural bill of 
fare so showy and tempting, and apparently exhaust- 
less — more so than that of any modern Delmonico, or 
of even that world-renowned chef de cuisine Careme — 
one worthy of the Rocher Cancale* — enongh to make 
epicures of all the fathers and mothers of Hartford, 
and to render surfeit " the father of much fast." 

But more than all, as bearing upon future trade 
and commerce, and so upon the pecuniary prospects 
of the Settlers, there were the otter, the beaver, the 
fox, the raccoon, the mink, the muskrat, most abund- 
ant, not only where the Settlers paused, but along the 
whole Connecticut River from its source down. The 
river would form a natural highway for the transmis- 
sion of their valuable skins. It communicated with 
numerous tribes of Indians to the north, with the 
lakes and the natives of Canada, and the site of 
Hartford could be reached by vessels from the ocean. 
There already had the Dutch, for some time past, pur- 
chased annually no less than ten thousand skins, and 
not unfrequently Massachusetts and Plymouth had 
sent in ships to England one thousand pounds sterl- 
ing worth of them at a time, brought chiefly from the 
Connecticut. Well might Hooker and his party, then, 
delight in their pecuniary prospects ! All the consid- 



* A Paris restaurant, whore, as John Sanderson metaphorically says, " you 
would think the servants were bearing along the sacred things of Mother Ves- 
ta — their feet are muffled, and the dishes are of velvet." 



ITS FIRST APPEARANCE. 21 

erations which now a days, with materials of commerce 
entirely different, have impelled the citizens of Hart- 
ford to urge new facilities of travel down the Con- 
necticut valley to this city, and to improve and keep 
open navigation hence to the sea, operated in modi- 
fied forms on the minds of the Hartford Settlers in 
choosing their locality, and rallied chiefly around the 
trade in skins — especially the skins of the quick, slen- 
der, shrewd, soft-skinned otter, and the broad-tailed, 
ingenious, industrious, epicurean beaver. Well, in 
this view, as they survey the Connecticut, and see the 
log canoe of the Indian skimming its waters, and 
think of their own commercial future, of their own 
pinnaces soon to come and return freighted with the 
stores of their settlement — well may we put in their 
mouths the graphic language of Brainard: 

" 'Tis here the otter dives, the beaver feeds, 
Where pensive osiers dip their willowy weeds; 
And as the unharmed swallow skims his way, 
And lightly drops his pinions in thy spray, 
So the swift sail shall seek thy inland seas, 
And swell and whiten in thy purer breeze, 
New paddles dip thy waters, and strange oars 
Feather thy waves, and touch thy noble shores !" 

Thus upon a nearer view, in respect to its fertility 
and trade, appeared the site of Hartford to the first 
Settlers. 

But upon it, as already suggested, and around it, 
were Indians — many. On the site itself was a tribe 
which, for the want of any other known appellative, 
we may designate from the known name of the site 
itself, as the tribe of Suckiage. South of the site was 
a tribe tributary to the Mattabesetts. North were sev- 



22 HARTFORD. 

eral tribes known as the Mattanag, subsequently as the 
Windsor Indians. East were the Podunk and the Hoc- 
canum Indians, and west the Tunxis tribe. They num- 
bered in all, probably some three thousand. Wild, 
artful, active, sullen in anger, courageous under tor- 
ture, superstitious — dressing in skins of wild beasts, 
with belts of wampum and ornaments carved of bone, 
shells and stones — frightful with paints and feathers, 
and figures, indelible in their skins, of birds and beasts 
of prey — they were occupied, the men in hunting, fish- 
ing, shooting, in martial exercises and in war, and the 
women, both in and out of doors, as drudges. Their 
weapons were the bow, strung with the sinew of the 
deer — the arrow, headed with flint — the spear, headed 
with bone or stone — and the tomahawk and scalping- 
knife, made of wood or stone. They had canoes 
hollowed from the whitewood, pine and chestnut, and 
nets wrought with cords of hemp, and fish-hooks 
made of flexible bones. They were domesticated in 
wigwams made of young trees bent and covered with 
mats of bark, and furnished with a few simple uten- 
sils, such as knives, pestles, mortars and chisels, made 
of stone, shells and reeds. They fed on wild animals, 
their entrails as well as their flesh, on nuts, acorns, 
the gleanings of the forest, and on corn, beans and 
squashes. They worshipped a Great Spirit whom 
they called Kitchtan, an Evil Spirit whom they called 
Hobammocko, and led on by priests denominated 
Powaws, paid homage to fire, and water, and thunder, 
and lightning. They had a plurality of wives. They 
were impure in their morals. Their justice was rude 
and severe. Their government was an absolute mon- 



ITS FIRST APPEARANCE. 23 

archy. The will of their Sachems, aided by a few 
chosen counsellors, called the Paniese, was held in pro- 
found awe, and obeyed without question. 

Such were the aboriginal inhabitants of the coun- 
try into which the Hartford Settlers came ! Yet, 
though wild, though fierce and intractable in their 
commerce with each other, circumstances had ren- 
dered them as a mass friendly to the whites. They 
lived in and around the site of Hartford, tributary to 
and in perpetual fear of both the Mohawks and the 
Pequots. The English, they thought, would aid in 
their protection. Hence, in past years, they had sent 
on to Massachusetts and Plymouth, soliciting the 
white men to settle among them, and offering them, if 
they would do so, as did Wahquimacut a Sachem, 
in 1631, annual presents of corn and beaver skins. 
Hooker and his party, then, had no immediate dread 
of the tomahawk and scalping-knife. They were re- 
ceived by the natives with great kindness, aided with 
provisions, and instructed by them in a knowledge of 
the country. Watchfulness and jealousy came after- 
wards, not at first. 

Truly, in view of the spot they had chosen for set- 
tlement, its soil, its scenery, its wood, its timber, its 
water, its marketable attraction, its security, and the 
long, broad, cheerful vista it opened to the eye of im- 
provement, truly the Hartford Settlers might feel that 
their lot had fallen in a pleasant place ! And so they 
did! Scjeva. 



urtfo rir. 



ITS PURCHASE.— ITS DISTRIBUTION AND PLAN. 

No. 3. 

" Hither the neighboring Indian Kings resort, 

And join with them in articles of peace, 

And of their lands make firm conveyances ; 

And being now by deeds and leagues secure, 

Their towns they build, their purchased lands manure." 

Roger Wolcott. 

The first step of the Settlers after their arrival was, 
of course, to purchase land. They had been for some 
time close neighbors and friends, were already organ- 
ized as a church, had been members of townships, 
and were familiar therefore with action as a body. 
They agreed then, in the first place, to purchase terri- 
tory jointly, and afterwards to parcel it out. Accord- 
ingly Mr. Samuel Stone and Mr. William Goodwin 
were appointed, in behalf of the proprietors, to treat 
for land with the tribe of Suckiage. 

At this time Sequassen was its chief Sachem. He 
was an Indian of considerable notoriety. He was of 
the blood royal — was proud. It was his boast that he 
never had been conquered by the Pequots, nor paid 
them tribute. He was warlike. He met the renowned 
Uncas in battle, and though vanquished, retired with- 
out disgrace. He was persevering. When his friend 
4 



26 



hartford: its purchase, 



and ally, a neighboring sagamore, was slain, he thun- 
dered his claim for the " meane" murderer at the fort 
of the Podnnks, allied Uncas actively with his purpose 
of revenge, and was with difficulty appeased, if at all 
so, by the intervention of the General Court. He had 
occasional differences with the whites. He burned 
Mr. Andrew Warner's hedge, and paid damages only 
after he had been brought before Governor Haynes 
and threatened with an attachment. Once he was 
strongly suspected of conspiring with Miantinomo "to 
draw the Indians into a confederation" against the 
English, but without, it seems, just foundation. Once 
he was charged with conspiring the death of certain 
magistrates among the English — was arrested, impris- 
oned, tried before the Commissioners of the United 
Colonies, and, for want of proof, was acquitted. He 
was a landholder of some consequence. Besides 
Hartford he had land east "beyond the river." He 
was rather extensively connected both by blood and 
treaty with surrounding Sachems. He was upon the 
whole friendly to the English, and once testified 
strongly in their favor, in open Court, against the 
Dutch. Though vindictive and wary, he seems to 
have loved his friends, and adhered to his promises. 
He was quite fair for an Indian. 

Such was the chief with whom Mr. Stone and Mr. 
Goodwin had to negotiate. They were successful, 
and so far as appears without trouble. With Sequas- 
sen's consent, and that of " those of his tribe also who 
were of age" to declare it, and " with the consent of 
the rest of the inhabitants of the place," they soon 
purchased an area about the same as our present 



ITS DISTRIBUTION AND PLAN. 27 

township. It was to extend from a tree marked 
N. F., which was " the divident between Hartford and 
Wethersfield" on the south, to Windsor bounds on 
the north, and from the Great River on the east " full 
six miles" into the wilderness on the west — and it em- 
braced all " meadows, pastures, woodes, underwood, 
stones, quarries, brookes, ponds, rivers, profitts, comod- 
ities and appurtenances whatsoever." The original 
deed, witnessed by " many natives and English inhab- 
itants," is lost. A renewal of it, however, by the heirs 
and successors of the Sachem who granted it, bearing 
date 1670, and reciting its subsequent confirmation by 
Sequassen, and his enlargement of the original grant 
" westward as far as his country went," is still pre- 
served. These heirs and successors have strange 
names — Masseekcup, Williamsqua, Wawarme, who 
was the sister and only heir of Sequassen, Keepequam, 
Seacutt, Jack Spiner, Currecombe, Weehassatucka 
squa, and Seacunk squa! What jawbreakers! Try 
and pronounce them! And the original marks of 
these Indians are as grotesque as their names are 
strangely compounded. Caliban, invoking all the 
charms of his mother Sycorax, could not have traced 
stranger figures. 

The consideration of the deed no where appears. 
It would be curious to know what it was — probably 
cloth, axes, kettles, knives, &c, as were paid by the 
Dutch in their purchase of the Point. That a consid- 
eration was given, that it was increased when Sequas- 
sen confirmed his grant, and was enlarged again when 
his heirs and successors renewed it, " to near the value 
the land was esteemed at before the English came in- 



28 hartford: its purchase. 

to these parts," is apparent from the deed of renewal 
itself. The fathers of Hartford then honorably and 
satisfactorily paid for the township. This is a grati- 
fying fact. 

Soon as acquired, the land, one large portion of it 
required for immediate use, was at once distributed to 
the new proprietors, one part for houselots, and anoth- 
er for farms, for plow and meadow lots. In this dis- 
tribution, as was just, the few settlers who had preced- 
ed Hooker and his party shared. The first part was 
in lots of about two acres each, and was arranged so 
as nearly to cover the present thickly settled portion of 
our city. Bach Settler had one of these. The sec- 
ond part stretched in every direction out from the first. 
and was distributed to the Settlers in different propor- 
tions, according to their means, their contributions to- 
wards the purchase, sometimes according to their ser- 
vices, sometimes their necessities, and sometimes their 
dignity. Each grant was upon condition that the 
land should be improved, or else rettirned to the town. 
These lots, witli occasional relaxations of the rule, 
were to be built upon within twelve months, and the 
houses, by way of precaution against fire, were to 
have each a ladder or a tree running to within two 
feet of their tops. In case any proprietor wished to 
sell, the town, paying only for any labor expended, 
was to have the preference as purchaser. It was to 
hold also in reversion all lots abandoned for four years 
by the removal of any grantee from the settlement, 
and could at any time, upon compensation made, run 
highways wherever deemed necessary. 

These highways it is important to know, at least 



ITS DISTRIBUTION AND PLAN. 29 

generally, if we would get a proper conception of 
Hartford, as originally laid out. Dull of course, Read- 
er, the statement must prove to some of you, we are 
aware. But it is essential to our purpose — important 
to you if you feel interest enough in the town to be 
versed in its history. Start not then, " nor deem our 
spirit fled," if carefully and coldly we unbury for a 
moment the bones of Hartford, dry though they be, 
for our own city is their monument : 

" Kedeemed from worms and wasting clay, 
This chance is theirs, to be of use." 

Walk with vis then, if you please, to the foot of the 
present State House Square. This spot was fixed 
upon by the Settlers as a site for their Meeting-house. 
Running hence down present State Street, winding a 
little distance through present Front Street, and strik- 
ing diagonally to the foot of present Kilbourn Street 
to the river, they laid out a highway which they called 
"Road to the Ferry" and also "Road to the Little 
Meadow." The meadow here mentioned was the lev- 
el area, then much larger than now, which extends 
from Little River to the North Meadow Creek. At 
the foot of Ferry Street a " Town Landing" was es- 
tablished. There was another " Landing," at the cor- 
ner of present Arch and Front Streets — and running 
from this point north was a "Road from Little River 
to North Meadow" a name which the meadow still 
preserves — and running from the same point, on both 
sides of Little River, to near the present Railroad De- 
pot, were two roads, called each "Highway by the Lit- 
tle River." From the junction of the present North 



30 hartford: its purchase. 

Main and Trumbull Streets, south to the bridge, was 
another highway called "Road from Centinel Hill to 
the Palisado" Centinel Hill was then quite an eleva- 
tion, and for many years supplied the town with a 
sentry-place, and with dirt and gravel. The Palisado 
was probably some fortification. From the present 
State House Square again, turning at the corner of 
present Pearl Street, and running along the bank of 
Little River to the foot of present West Pearl Street, 
where the first site for a mill was chosen, was another 
highway called "Meeting- House to the Mill" and 
which, continued on over present Lord's Hill, was 
called "Road from the Mill to the Country." On the 
south-west corner of present Pearl Street, was a house 
lot set off to Seth Grant. From this point then north, 
in ihe line of present Trumbull Street, was another 
highway called " Centinel Hill to Seth Grant's House." 
From Centinel Hill, one road led off in the line of the 
present Albany Turnpike, and was called "Centinel 
Hilt to the Cow Pasture" — a pasture embracing about 
one thousand acres, and lying north of the turnpike 
and west of the present Windsor road. Continued 
on, this road was called " Cow Pasture to the Count/-//." 
Another road led from the Hill named, to the North 
Meadow, and was called " Centinel Hill to the North 
Meadow." It joined the highway from Little River, 
and the two ran off, either through the meadow or 
along on the bank in the adjacent Neck, in a "Road to 
Windsor." South of the present Main Street Bridge 
again, and running from it to a tract of about four 
hundred and fifty acres, which extended from the pres- 
ent Burying Ground on the New Haven Turnpike 



ITS DISTRIBUTION AND PLAN. 31 

east to the South Meadow, and was called the " Ox 
Pasture" was another highway designated as the 
"Road to the Ox Pasture" and also as the "Road to 
Wether sfield." Nearly parallel with this, and running 
from the site of the mill heretofore mentioned, on by 
the present Trinity College, through Cooper Lane, 
thence diagonally, till it struck the south part of pres- 
ent Washington Street, past the present Insane Retreat, 
and so on to the large, level tract beyond which crosses 
the New Haven Turnpike, was a road called, the first 
portion of it, "Road from the Mill to the Country" 
and the second portion "Road from George SteeVs to 
the Great Sivamp." Nearly parallel again with this, 
but winding as it joins present Main Street, was an- 
other highway, present Cole Street, called the "Road 
to Wethersfield" or " to the Ox Pasture." Intersecting 
these roads, besides that along Little River already 
mentioned, was another, which starting in present 
Washington Street, ran partly through present Buck- 
ingham Street and through Charter Street, down to 
the meadow then designated and now known as the 
"South Meadow." This road was called, its upper 
portion, "George SteeVs to the South Meadow" the 
part from present Main to Cole Street, " Giles Smith's 
to William Gibbon's" the part below "Road to the 
South Meadow" or " to the Indians Land." 

Various cart paths and alleys ran through the orig- 
inal plat as now described, and in every direction 
around and beyond it were land locations designated 
by a great variety of names, and set off sometimes to 
one, sometimes to a number of proprietors in common. 
Such were, besides some above mentioned, the West 



32 



hartford: its purchase. 



Field, Brick Hill, Bridgefield, Blue Hills, Pine Field, 
Venturer's Field, Poke Hill, Rod,-// Hill, Indian's Land, 
Soldier's Field* i5cc, and towards present "West Hart- 
ford, reaching from Wethersfield to Windsor, there 
was a large strip of land called the " Commons," which 
was set apart for public use, for pasture, timber and 
wood. The rest of the town was reserved undivided 
in the hands of the Proprietors, to be distributed from 
time to time thereafter as occasion should require. 

Of the house-lots those chiefly were first improved, 
by the erection of buildings, which lay along Little 
River, and the present Main, Front and Cole Streets. 
In present Arch Street, Hooker and Stone and Wm. 
Goodwin and Richard Webb planted themselves, and 
on the opposite side of the river, among others were 



* This last location doubtless has sonic history. What it is we know not, 
but think that the present worthy Treasurer of the Town can enlighten the 
Public about it. We invite him to do so. And by way of compensation we 
will treat him in advance to the first record establishing the office which he 
now holds, and appointing the first officer. 

"Feb. 14, 1659, Ensign John Taleott was chosen by a vote of the Town, to 
be a Town Treasurer, or husband for the (own, to preserve the town stock, 
until the Town see cause to alter their order." 

" Husband for the town!" Good enough ! We had always hitherto won- 
dered at the confirmed celibacy of the present excellent successor of Ensign 
John Taleott. For him no love " learned in a lady's eyes," no courtship's 
smiling day, no rosy bondage, no babies dear ! 

" In vain to soothe his solitary shade, 

Has Love his notes in mingling measure played." 

Yet, consistently with the Record, he could not have yielded to the siren 
without committing bigamy, and being a gentleman of singular uprightness, 
he is " fain not to sin." It is perhaps fortunate for the town, that its present 
Husband has no other wife ! 

[The Treasurer cheerfully complied with the suggestion in the note above, 
as will be seen hereafter. Ed.] 



ITS DISTRIBUTION AND PI, AN. 33 

Andrew Bacon, Nathaniel Ward and Andrew Wake- 
man. 

Along Front Street, among others, were James 
Olmsted, Timothy Standley, William Bull, William 
Westwood and Stephen Hart. 

Along Main Street, among others, were John Steele, 
our first Town Clerk, Richard Olmsted, Richard Lord, 
Clement Chaplin, John Pratt, John Talcott and Na- 
thaniel Ely. 

South of West Pearl Street, and on the banks of 
Little River, were Thomas Stanton and Nathaniel 
Richards. 

Along Trumbull Street, among others, were Wil- 
liam Wadsworth, John Clark, Thomas Burchwood 
and Thomas Hale. 

On the road from present Buckingham Square to 
Washington Street, were, among others, John Moody, 
Richard Lyman and Thomas Bull. 

Along present Cole Street, were at first Thomas 
Hosmer and William Whiting, and subsequently Ed- 
ward Hopkins, John Webster, Thomas Wells and 
George Wyllys, four Governors, as they became, of 
Connecticut. On this street now lives our present 
Governor, his Excellency Thomas H. Seymour. Bos- 
ton, also, the last of the Negro Governors, lived and 
died upon it. Five Governors of Connecticut from 
one street in Hartford, besides a sixth one of ebony ! 
The fact is most remarkable ! It deserves commemo- 
ration. A petition for this purpose is in progress, 
praying that the present name of the street in ques- 
tion may be changed to " Governor's Street." Our 
municipal officers cannot we think but make the 



34 hartford: its purchase. 

change. It will be pleasing, appropriate, and we 
doubt not, find favor with all.* 

Behold our town now, Reader, platted, nearly as we 
can plat it in brief description. Take a pen or pencil, 
if you feel interest enough, and draw it ! You will in 
this way get an idea of its appearance, sufficiently 
correct for the general purpose we have in view. But 
we will furnish you with a map of it soon, an exact 
one. It is afoot. 

Meanwhile look at Hartford as it is forming — fast ! 
The Settlers are busy providing shelters for themselves — 
houses and huts. Listen to the reverberation of their 
axes, the buzz of their saws, the blows of their ham- 
mers ! They are felling trees, shaping timber, sawing 
boards, cleaving shingles, digging cellars, digging wells, 
and carting earth and stones. Their stock is turned 
out in wood and meadow to crop and graze. Already 
milk-maids sing, perhaps to some " responsive swains." 
Plows are busy opening here and there the virgin soil. 
Bareheaded Indians in fantastic attire — their hair stiff- 
ened by paint and bear's grease into the straightness 
of cock's-combs and crests, or falling in thick, heavy 
plaits about their tawny necks — come, in fringed shirts 
and skirts, and beaded breeches, leggins and mocca- 
sins, up from the North and South Meadows, where 
they soon began chiefly to hut, to supply the new 
comers with corn and game, and receive in return 
trinkets and wampum. The children of the whites 



* A cheerful response was given to this suggestion, and March 10th, 1851, 
by a unanimous vote of the Common Council of Hartford, Cole Street be- 
came Governor's Street. 



ITS DISTRIBUTION AND PLAN. 35 

stare at them, as they pass, with wonder not unmin- 
gled with fear, then turn to their sports again beneath 
the trees, 

" And many a gambol frolic on the ground, 
While the loud laughter titters round." 

Their fathers are thinking of a school-house for them, 
and will make it. So pass the week-days to the Set- 
tlers, in bustle, labor, contrivance for present subsist- 
ence, and preparation for permanent conveniences — 
and at that fortunate " purple" period of the year when 
zephyrs fling their fragrance through the clear, blue 
sky, and " the insect youth are on the wing," and herds 
low for their young, and warblers pour their notes — 
while the Rivulet, as the Settlers often beautifully 
called our present Little River, chimed over the rocks 
and pebbles in its bed, and the winds gently swept the 
skirts of those far spreading woods, which to them 
were " far more free from peril than the envious court." 
And Sundays, and " Lecture Days," how careful the 
devotion ! Regularly on these occasions, and morning 
and evening daily, collected either in some house or in 
the open air, perhaps in some barn or beneath some 
spreading oak, as were the New Haven Colonists at 
first, the pious Settlers of Hartford proffer unquestion- 
ably to Heaven the warm request, 

" That He who stills the raven's clamorous nest, 

And decks the lily fair in flowery pride, 

Would in the way His wisdom sees the best, 

For them and for their little ones provide, 

But chiefly in their hearts with grace divine preside." 

We will look at their progress in another article. 

SciEVA. 



§iaxfe §ahtwxs is Conucrftnit 

No. 4. 

BY WAY OF NOTE TO " HARTFORD. NO. 8." 

" Laugh an' sing until to-morrow, 
'Tis de Darkies holiday ! 

Chorus. Let's be gay, &c." 

Not a veritable, constitutional, black Governor for 
the whites, Reader — no — but a chief executive black 
officer, among the blacks, for themselves ! We alluded 
to the circumstance in our Article Third on Hartford, 
but finding it little understood, we cheerfully comply 
with a request from several sources to explain it. 

For many years previous to the American Revolu- 
tion, throughout this event, and long after — down 
nearly to 1820, and perhaps a little later — it was the 
custom of the negroes of Connecticut, in imitation of 
the whites, to elect a Governor for themselves. This 
they generally effected on some day, usually the Sat- 
urday next succeeding the Election Day of the whites, 
and they called it their " Lection Day." At this time 
they were generally assembled in unusual numbers, 
with their masters, in one of the capitals of the State. 
They of course made their election to a large extent, 
deputatively, as all could not be present, but uniform- 



38 



BLACK GOVERNORS 



ly yielded to it their assent — and their confidence was 
at times so unlimited, that without any choice by 
themselves, they readily permitted their existing Gov- 
ernor to assign his office over to another one of his col- 
or — as will be seen in a case we shall soon quote. 

The person they selected for the office in question, 
was usually one of much note among themselves, of 
imposing presence, strength, firmness and volubility, 
who was quick to decide, ready to command, and able 
to flog. If he was inclined to be a little arbitrary, be- 
longed to a master of distinction, and was ready to 
pay freely for diversions — these were circumstances in 
his favor. Still it was necessary he should be an hon- 
est negro, and be, or appear to be, " wise above his fel- 
lows." When elected, he had his aids, his parade, and 
appointed military officers, sheriffs, and justices of the 
peace. The precise sphere of his power we cannot 
ascertain. Probably it embraced " matters and things 
in general" among the blacks, morals, manners, and 
ceremonies. He settled all grave disputes in the last 
resort, questioned conduct, and imposed penalties and 
punishments sometimes for vice or misconduct. He 
was respected as " Gubernor," say many old gentle- 
men to us, by the negroes throughout the State, and 
obeyed almost implicitly. 

His parade days were marked by much that was 
showy, and by some things that were ludicrous. A 
troop of blacks, sometimes an hundred in number, 
marching sometimes two and two on foot, sometimes 
mounted in true military style and dress on horseback, 
escorted him through the streets, with drums beating, 
colors flying, and fifes, fiddles, clarionets, and every 



IN CONNECTICUT. 



39 



" sonorous metal" that could be found, " uttering mar- 
tial sound." After marching to their content, they 
would retire to some large room which they would 
engage for the purpose, for refreshments and delibera- 
tion. This was all done with the greatest regard to 
ceremony. His ebony excellency would pass through 
the files of his procession, supported by his aids, with 
an air of consummate dignity, to his quarters, and 
there receive the congratulations of his friends, and 
dispense the favor of his salutations, his opinions and 
his appointments. One of these occasions, in Hins- 
dale's tavern, on the site now occupied by Hon. H. 
Barnard, is well remembered by an old gentleman now 
living, who informs us that Quaw, a negro then be- 
longing to Col. George Wyllys, enacted the Governor 
at this time to great satisfaction, and was the stiffest 
and proudest " Darkie" he ever saw. 

Another of the black governors at one time was Pe- 
leg Nott, who belonged to Col. Jeremiah "Wadsworth. 
Peleg was a " first-rate feller," we are told — remarkable 
for his exact dress and military bearing. He superin- 
tended his master's farm in West Hartford, the same 
now occupied by Z. Alden, Esq., and was, to use the 
language of our informant, "the most independent 
man in the West Division." He drove a Provision 
Cart in the war while Col. Wadsworth was Commis- 



sary. 



When elected Governor, a curious accident be- 



fel him. The place of the election was on the Neck, 
near the north burying yard. Peleg, after he was cho- 
sen, had no sooner mounted his horse, booted and 
spurred, than his impatient and fiery steed started at 
once for a pond which then lay a little south of the 



40 BLACKGOVERNORS 

cemetery mentioned, and plunging headlong into it, 
bespattered his excellency from head to foot with mud 
and water. Not long after this occurrence, Peleg met 
Col. Wadsworth one day, and the following dialogue 
occurred. " Massa, me want to be free," said Peleg. 
" What do you want to be free for ?" said Col. Wads- 
worth. " Oh Massa, freedom's sweet," replied Peleg. 
"Well then," said his master, "I'll make you free." 
" When will you make me so?" inquired Peleg. " Noiv" 
answered Col. Wadsworth — " you are free from this 
day." And he became so. 

Boston, belonging to a Mr. Nichols, who left him a 
handsome estate, was another of the black governors. 
He lived in Cole Street, and was a genuine African. 
He used to boast that the real Guinea negro never 
stole, but only negroes born in this country. All who 
remember him, and there are many, concur in giving 
him the character of "a stable, respectable man." He 
held his office many years — and when he died, which 
was about forty years ago, he was buried with funeral 
honors. With his cocked hat and sword upon his cof- 
fin, and followed by a numerous train, he was carried 
into the South Congregational Church, and there Dr. 
Flint pronounced a sort of funeral eulogy over his re- 
mains, which were afterwards deposited in the Centre 
Burying Ground. He had a son named Roman, who 
was crazy, and in his craziness was intolerably filthy. 
A ludicrous anecdote is told of Roman and Dr. Strong. 
The latter once employed Roman to hive a swarm of 
bees. When within about twenty feet of the swarm, 
it suddenly formed in a solid battalion about six inch- 
es deep and three feet long, and poured on directly to- 



IN CONNECTICUT. 41 

wards Roman with such impetuosity that Dr. Strong 
thought the poor fellow would certainly be killed. 
But the swarm, soon as it approached within two feet 
of him, abruptly turned off in another direction and 
left him undisturbed. " The bees," added our inform- 
ant, "couldn't stand Roman!" 

There were many other black governors from other 
parts of the State than Hartford ; from Middletown, 
Norwich, Wallingford, Peter Freeman from Farming- 
ton, &c. Others from Hartford were Cuff and John 
Anderson. 

The following extract from Hinman's American 
Revolution presents curious facts with regard to these 
blacks, and to whites also. They will richly reward 
perusal : 

" At the early period of the war, (May 14, 1776,) the Americans 
■were jealous and alarmed at the rustling of every leaf, and watchful 
of every movement. At this time, Cuff was Governor of the blacks 
in Connecticut. He had held the office for ten years, and on the 11th 
of May aforesaid, he resigned his office to John Anderson, a negro 
servant of Gov. Skeen, which resignation and appointment were in 
the words and figures following, viz : 

"Hartford, 11th May, 1776. 

"I Governor Cuff of the Niegro's in the province of Connecticut, 
do Resign my Govermentshipe to John Anderson, Niegor Man to 
Governor Skene. 

" And I hope that you will obeye him as you have Done me for 
this ten years past, when Colonel Willis' Niegor Diyed, I was the 
next. But being weak and unfit for that office do Resine the said 
Governmentshipe to John Anderson. 

"I: John Anderson having the Honour to be appointed Governor 

6 



42 BLACK GOVERNORS 

over you, I will do my utmost endevere to serve you in Every Res- 
pect, and I hope you will obey me accordingly. 

John Andersox, Governor 
over the Niegors in Connecticut. 
Witnesses present, 

The late Governor Cuff, Hartford, 

Quackow, 

Petter Wadsworth, 

Titows, 

Pomp Willis, 

John Jones, 

Fraday." 

"May, 1776. At this appointment, the citizens of Hartford be- 
came alarmed ; Gov. Skeen was at once suspected of being concerned 
in his negro's election, with some design upon the citizens of the state. 
Therefore the Governor and Council of the colony convened at Hart- 
ford, took the subject into solemn consideration, and appointed a com- 
mittee to investigate the subject, of which Jesse Root Esq., was chair- 
man ; the committee took with them a constable and immediately re- 
paired to Gov. Skeen's lodgings, found his door locked, and the govern- 
or absent. One of the committee remained to guard his room, while 
others proceeded after him, and found him returning home, and 
brought him before the committee, and on enquiry whether he had 
carried on any correspondence with our enemies, he answered he had 
sacredly kept his engagements in his parole, and had no papers but 
his own private papers, and offered his keys to the committee to ex- 
amine his papers. He was asked if he had any previous knowledge 
of the negroes electing his servant governor of the negroes, or had 
any hand in effecting said election — which he denied, except a few 
words that passed between a Mr. Williams and his negro, which he 
supposed was mere sport, and had no hand in bringing it to pass, di- 
rectly or indirectly. He was enquired of if he gave his negro mon- 
ey to make a feast for the negroes — he answered that he gave him a 
half-joe to keep election, but that he knew nothing of the treat at 
Knox's ; that on Friday he heard his negro was chosen governor, and 
was fearful it might excite jealousy, and even avoided speaking to 



IN CONNECTICUT, 



43 



him to avoid suspicion, and declared upon his honor he had no pa- 
pers about him. 

" The committee then proceeded to examine the negro governor, 
who stated that one Sharper, a negro man, first mentioned to him 
about being governor, and that he informed the negroes, if they 
would elect him, he would treat them to the amount of $20, and it 
had cost him $25, but declared that no regular officer or soldier had 
spoken to him on the subject ; that there was no scheme or plot, and 
that he had done it as a matter of sport, and intended no injury to 
the country, but had the curiosity of seeing an election ; that he had 
been informed the negroes chose a governor annually, and thought 
he would set up for it. He stated that he got his $25 by going in a 
vessel on the lakes, where he had certain perquisites of his own. 

The committee made many other enquiries of Gov. Skeen and his 
servants, together with the captain, (Delaplace.) And ex-Governor 
Cuff stated that he had been advised to resign his office to Skeen's 
negro by some of his black friends and some of the regulars, and 
that he appointed him without an election, as some of them declared 
they would not have a tory for a governor. On Friday night after 
the election, the negroes had a dance and entertainment at Mr. 
Knox's, in Hartford, at an expense of 50s., which was paid by others, 
and Gov. Skeen's negroes were not allowed to pay anything. This 
bill was paid by Majors French and Dermct; which facts were stated 
to the Governor and Council by Jesse Root Esq., Chairman, May 
22d, 1776." 



Curious, Reader, is it not? You will laugh and 
wonder, no doubt — perhaps inquire what on the whole 
was the influence of the custom under consideration ? 
Well, we are satisfied from all we have heard that this 
influence was a useful one. " It kept the blacks in 
good order," say many old gentlemen to us, " while it 
at the same time innocently gratified their fondness 
for enjoyment." Their peace justices or Squires, as 
they were called, really at times entertained important 



44 



BLACK GOVERNORS 



cases, but decided them most generally with a leaning 
towards severity. Here is a case illustrating this last 
statement. A black in Hartford, who had been guilty 
of thieving, was taken before Jonathan Bull Esq., for 
trial. "Better carry him down to Squire Nep," said 
Mr. Bull. It was accordingly done. Now Nep, or 
Neptune as he was called at length, was a black justice 
of the peace — a barber by trade, and noted # for his in- 
tegrity, sternness, and influence with those of his own 
color. He was much respected too by the whites. 
Squire Nep heard the case, ordered the criminal to 
give up all his tobacco and his gun by way of restitu- 
tion, and sentenced him to receive thirty lashes on his 
bare back. This sentence was carried into effect on 
the South Green — by candle light. The lashes were 
put on, says our informant, " most unmercifully" — and 
though the candle went out two or three times during 
the process, it was re-lighied, that the sentence might 
be carried into full effect. A threat to be carried to 
" old Nep," always operated as a terror to the blacks, 
and kept them orderly. 

We have got a well-behaved set of f hem now, taken 
as a whole — it is certain. Many of them are " prime" 
in a better than a mercantile sense. Our city is in 
this respect favored. Sceva. 



D'artfarlr- 



MAP OF THE TOWN IN 16 40, 



No. 5. 



" Cities and towns, the various haunts of men, 
Bequire the pencil; they defy the pen. 

* * * * Can we so describe 
That you may fairly streets and buildings trace, 
And all that gives distinction to a place? 
This cannot be ; yet moved by your request, 
A part I paint — let Fancy form the rest." 



Crabbe. 



We promised it to you, Reader — and here it is — a 
Map of Hartford, as it appeared two hundred and 
thirteen years ago! It is the same, "with reverend 
mosses gray," to which we referred in Article Third of 
our Historical Series. 

December 10th, 1838, its execution was ordered by 
the Town, upon a motion made by our venerable and 
respected fellow-citizen, James Ward Esq., who has 
ever been honorably distinguished for his thoughtful- 
ness and devotion in throwing light upon the past. It 
was voted " that the Selectmen be authorized to pro- 
cure a Survey of our Town as originally laid out, with 
reference to its ancient history, and with the altera- 
tions in its public roads since that time, at an expense 



46 HARTFORD. 

not exceeding three hundred dollars." December 30th, 
1839, Mr. Ward, and Messrs. Nathaniel Goodwin, 
Alfred Smith, and James B. Hosmer, were appointed 
a Committee to carry this vote into effect, and for this 
purpose engaged the services of "William S. Porter 
Esq., of Farmington. 

Mr. Porter has been long and favorably known as a 
careful investigator of records, and as a skilful survey- 
or and mapper. He entered upon his task, and from 
deeds and historic memorials, with patience and ex- 
actness, accomplished it, perfecting the map as he pro- 
gressed, in all cases of doubt, by surveys made by 
himself. And he has recently, in preparation for its 
publication, carefully reviewed it in connection with 
his own notes and memoranda, and rendered it un- 
questionably accurate. With our worthy Town Treas- 
urer, we carefully corrected its proof impressions, com- 
pared the Map with our records, and can testify, as 
can many others who have examined it, that it is a 
most reliable topographical picture of Hartford in its 
infancy. In the ancestral and historical associations 
which it cannot fail to awaken, you will be able, 
Reader, we trust, to lay up for yourself a store of 
comfort. By it you can pleasantly contrast Hartford 
as it was, with Hartford as it is, especially with the 
aid of Smith's recent Map of our City. Upon it you 
will find, many of you, the very spots — designated on 
the Map by little squares — on which the dwellings of 
your ancestors stood, when the wilderness and the 
savage howled around them. Was your Grandfather, 
Reader, generations back, located on this spot — or on 
that — or on that — or on which ? Look on the Map, 



MAP OF THE TOWN IN 1640. 47 

and find the homestead of the " Stock from which 
you sprung!" 

" Mark his old mansion, frowning through the trees" — 

and as you wander over and around it, seek sweet in- 
spiration from those household deities 

" whose guardian eye 
Marks each pure thought, ere registered on high," 

and sing fancies to the consecrated spot, and sigh and 
strive for a life pure as that passed by the first Settlers 
of Hartford.* Sceva. 



* The Map — through the ready contributions of a few gentlemen interested 
in the object, and especially of Messrs Boswell & Faxon — was first published 
in a beautiful form, on the sheet of the Hartford Daily Courant, after having 
been lithographed by Messrs Case & Green, of this city, with a taste and 
skill and exactness, in all respects worthy of the beautiful art which they 
profess. 



ffattforlL 



ITS FIRST ORGANIZATION, CIVIL AND RELIGIOUS. 

No. 6. 

" Law is the faint reflection in man's turbid mind 
Of the bright Order first by Heaven designed; 
Religion the deep homage of his finite soul 
In awful reverence of the Supreme control." 

Anon. 

" England, sir, is a nation which still I hope respects, and formerly adored, 
her freedom. The Colonists emigrated from you when this part of your 
character was most predominant; and they took their bias and direction the 
moment they parted from your hands." 

Speech of Edmund Burke. 

It is to be regretted that our Town records, previ- 
ous to 1639, are but exceedingly few in number. 
Printed altogether they would occupy but little more 
than a half-page of this work. From these however, 
from those of the General Court, and from references 
to the past and implications in records which succeed 
the founding of the town, we are able to glean an 
idea of its first organization. We have already re- 
ferred to Settlers as preceding Hooker and his party. 
Who were they ? How many of them ? Enough, we 
answer, to have commenced an organization town- 
wise, and, in connection with Windsor and Wethers- 
field, statewise. Previous to June, 1636, they held 
7 



50 HARTFORD. 

town meetings — one, the earliest, bearing date 1635. 
Previous to this time also they elected members of a 
General Court, which was held, the first one in our 
State, in Hartford, April 6th, 1636.* But everything 



* The two members of this Court from Hartford, were John Steele and 
William Westwood. The following notices of these men, are from' the pen of 
Hon. Thomas Day, of this city. 

"John Steele, one of the Commissioners from Massachusetts for governing 
the contemplated settlement in Connecticut, was a respectable and useful 
magistrate, though not a great or learned man. He was admitted a freeman 
in Massachusetts, in May, 1G34. In March, 1635, and again in September 
following, he was a deputy from Newtown in the general court of that col- 
onv. [1 Winth. 285, n.] He came to Connecticut and settled in Hartford, 
either in October, 1635, or early in the spring of 1636. He was present at 
the first general court held under the commission, in April, 1636, and attend- 
ed every other court during the continuance of that instrument. His name 
appears also among the magistrates in the general court, held on the 1st of 
May, 1037. 1I<- was afterwards a member of that body, in the capacity of 
deputy, for more than twenty years, his last attendance being in March, 1659. 
[1 & 2 Col. Rec. passim.] 

" He was the first Secretary of the government, and the first town-clerk of 
the town of Hartford. 

"In 1644, he was associated with Edward Hopkins, John Haynes, John 
Mason and James Boosey, as agents of the government, to treat with George 
Fenwick for the transfer of the fort at Say brook, with its appurtenances; and, 
in that capacity, he was a party to the agreement of December 5th, 1644. 
[1 Trumb. 538. 541-1 

"His homestead in Hartford, containing two acres, abutted, in the language 
of the record, 'on the highway leading from the Palisado to the meeting- 
house, on the West; on the alley to the meeting-house, on the East; on the 
land of Mr. Goodwin and Mr. Stone, on the South; and on Clement Chap- 
lin's land, on the North :' comprehending the greater part of the land on the 
East side of Main Street, between Wadsworth's alley and Grove Street, and 
extending Eastward a few rods beyond Prospect Street. [ Orig. Distrib. 461. 
474.] 

"In the year 1651, he removed to Farmington, and there spent the remain- 
der of his days. He died in 1664. 

" William Westwood was a native of Essex county, in England; whence he 
migrated to this country in or about the year 1632, and settled at Newtown, 
Mass.— since Cambridge. On the 4th of March, 1635, he was admitted a free- 
man of that community. [2 Winth. 364. app.] He removed to Connecticut, and 



ITS FIRST ORGANIZATION. 51 

with these first emigrants was comparatively feeble 
and inefficient, " scarce half made up," until the arriv- 
al of Hooker and his party, who, from their superior 
numbers, preparation, influence, and firmness of estab- 
lishment, are justly looked upon as the Founders of 
our town. They infused new activity, skill, knowl- 
edge and confidence, into the infant plantation. On 
their arrival the Settlement ceased to grope. It began 
to look upon the light, to breathe freely, to sink deep- 
ly the pillars of Church and State, and to clutch them 
with a firm grasp. Its aspect now, nearly as we can, 
though scantily of course from want of materials, we 
will present. 

The organization of the town was democratic, 
purely so as regards the action of those who, as In- 

settled at Hartford, either in the fall of 1635, or early in the spring of 1636. 
He -was present at the first court held in Connecticut, on the 26th of April, 
1636. He attended also every subsequent court, during the continuance of 
the commission ; but his name does not appear among the magistrates, after 
its expiration. He was, however, a deputy from Hartford, in the years 1642, 
1643, 1644, 1646, 1648, and for the last time, in 1656. 

" In 1639, he was one of the select-men of the town of Hartford ; and was 
chosen to that oifice once or twice afterwards. His name appears occasion- 
ally as one of the jurors in the trial of causes before the particular court. 

" His home-lot in Hartford, consisting of three acres, was on the West side 
of ' the highway leading from the little river to the North meadow,' now 
Front Street, with a cart-way through it to Sentinel Hill, being nearly or quite 
where Morgan Street now is. 

" In or about the year 1658, he removed to Hadley, Mass., where he spent 
the residue of his life. In 1659, he was one of the committee for laying out 
home-lots in that town ; and was often employed on other committees in pub- 
lic service. In 1663, he was one of the select-men of Hadley. 

"He died at Hadley, April 9th, 1669, aged about sixty-two. His wife 
Bridget, died May 12th, 1676. He had one daughter, Sarah, who married 
Aaron Cook, son of Capt Aaron Cook, of Northampton. To her he gave by 
will all his lands in Hartford. Her son, Aaron Cook, inheriting from her the 
same lands, removed to Hartford, and settled thereon." 



52 HARTFORD. 

habitants, framed it, and set it in motion. But who 
constituted Inhabitants, and as such participated in 
the construction ? The question is an important one. 

No persons, we answer, but those who were admit- 
ted as such by a vote of the town in public meeting. 
The Settlers were peculiarly careful and circumspect 
with regard to this matter. No idler, pauper, beggar, 
vagrant or vagabond, no vicious or abandoned person, 
coming to the place, stood the least chance of gaining 
a settlement with them, or of being permitted even to 
tarry. Even any young man. unmarried, no matter 
what his character, could not sojourn in any family 
without allowance from the town — nor could he, 
though belonging to the town, keep house by himself, 
under a penalty of twenty shillings, unless he had a 
servant or was a public officer. It was a great object 
with the Settlers to keep their body pure, and, so far 
as possible, to found it on the family — an object which 
it has been the policy of our Town and State to se- 
cure ever since, and which has always figured conspic- 
uously in our jurisprudence. 

We now permit no aliens to acquire a settlement 
with us, but by a vote of our inhabitants, or the con- 
sent of a majority of our civil authority and Select- 
men. We receive no one, as an inhabitant, from any 
other State or District or Territory of the United 
States, nor even from any other town in our own 
State, but upon certain express and watchful condi- 
tions. We shut out paupers from other towns and 
other States, so far as we can, and forbid the entertain- 
ment, harboring or hire of all persons whom we have 



ITS FIRST ORGANIZATION. 53 

once removed, or warned to depart. We do not, it is 
true, treat young bachelors as did the Founders of our 
town — not deeming them so young, if they behave 
themselves, as not to be useful inhabitants, nor so icy 
as not to be melted into wedlock by the rays of love. 
If we did, we should have a nest of them about our 
ears directly, buzzing and fretting like so many angry 
bees, and should encounter also the somewhat dead- 
ened sting of a few old ones in the hive, whose enfee- 
bled, not to say fussy wings, fail to lift them into the 
nuptial state. But the principle of all our legislation 
with regard to inhabitancy was established, as appears, 
with Hartford itself. It has come down to us, modi- 
fied in its application, but unimpaired in vitality — an 
essential, conservative principle, whose useful opera- 
tion it is to protect morals, to promote intelligence, 
and guard against expense. 

Constituted as we have described, the first Inhabit- 
ants of Hartford made their own assemblage the me- 
dium of their legislation. They established the Town 
Meeting — that little primitive nursery of republican 
truth, whose fruit now feeds and thrills the free soul of 
every man, woman and child among us. They made 
it the duty of every man who was an Inhabitant to 
attend it — under penalty of a fine, without good ex- 
cuse for each act of failure — nor would they allow 
him to leave the meeting until its conclusion, without 
sufficient reason. The fine in this case was at first 
small — but sixpence — yet its imposition indicates a 
strong sense of public duty. Every man, the Found- 
ers of Hartford thought, was interested, and deeply, in 



54 HARTFORD. 

the town — was bound to be acquainted with its affairs, 
to participate in them both by counsel and with will — 
was to contribute actively towards their due adminis- 
tration. Alas that such is not more generally the feel- 
ing now ! 

The officers first created by the town for the admin- 
istration of its affairs, were Townsmen, Constables, one 
or more, Surveyors, Chimney-Viewers, and occasional- 
ly Committees and Arbitrators. The duties of Towns- 
men were, in general, similar to those of our Select- 
men at the present day, but were more extensive. 
Exempted from training, watching and warding, they 
were " to order the common occasions of the town" in 
all cases except those involving the admission of new 
inhabitants, taxes, the grant of lands, and the altera- 
tion of highways. These matters were reserved for 
meetings of the town. They were also to exercise a 
supervision, somewhat minute, over the morals, man- 
ners, and even the private affairs of inhabitants — a 
supervision which, though not now tolerated to its for- 
mer extent, is yet a part of our present municipal sys- 
tem, and is seen spread out upon our Statute-Book in 
its application to taverners, victualling-house keepers, 
lunatics, spendthrifts, children employed in factories, 
paupers, vagabonds, and resurrectionists. The rest of 
the town functionaries mentioned, explain themselves 
sufficiently by their titles. Their duties were in all 
respects like those of similar officers in our own day, 
but it was much more common at first than now, to 
appoint temporary committees for the execution of 
municipal purposes, and to settle differences among 
inhabitants by an appeal to arbitration. Besides these 



ITS FIRST ORGANIZATION. 55 

already mentioned, the town had two other annual 
officers. These were its Deputies or Representatives 
to the General Court, who, in common with other 
Deputies from Windsor and Wethersfield, regulated 
the general concerns of the united towns, provided for 
their common defence, and acted judicially for the ad- 
ministration of estates, and for the settlement of im- 
portant, but sometimes even of trivial differences. 

From the two sources now indicated, the Town As- 
sembly and the General Court, all the laws and regu- 
lations of Hartford as a town, emanated from the be- 
ginning. It is worthy of remark, however obvious, 
that the same are the two present fountains of all its 
civil action. With wisdom and foresight, and in a 
spirit truly just and patriotic, the Fathers of Hartford 
established them — blasted them through the rocks of 
a wilderness into a well of republican truth, whose 
waters have gushed unfailingly to irrigate and bless a 
town freedom of more than two centuries. 

The earliest town laws passed, relate to the duties 
of town officers, inhabitants and householders, to 
grants of house-lots and lands, to the employment of 
men and cattle in public service, to rates of wages, to 
taxes, highways, fences, to stray swine and cattle, to 
pounds, to defence, and to trade with the Indians. 

There were doubtless also laws relating to schools, 
though none of them are preserved previous to 1642, 
at which time " thirty pounds a year," are settled up- 
on " the town school." This entry, as well as numer- 
ous succeeding entries, and the character and circum- 
stances of the Settlers, plainly indicate that among 



56 HARTFORD. 

the earliest subjects which claimed their attention, that 
of education was one. The School-House doubtless 
stood side by side in formation with the Church — and 
had its master too, of whom 

" The village all declared how much he knew ; 
'Twas certain he could read and cipher too; 
Lands he could measure, terms and times presage, 
And even the story ran that he could gauge." 

Blessed, thrice blessed be the Founders of Hartford, 
that they established the School — that noble instru- 
mentality which not alone made their own immediate 
settlement successful, but which has been woven, as 
with gold and steel, into the web of our prosperity to 
the present day. and which — while many of our sister 
States have their twenties, and thirties, and forties, 
and even fifties of thousands to whom books are a 
sealed letter and paper a blank — makes it the proud 
boast, not alone of Hartford, but of every citizen of 
Connecticut, in a territory numbering nearly four hun- 
dred thousand souls, that here is a State in which but 
about three hundred of its native population cant/ot read 
mill write!* 

There is nothing peculiar in the laws of Hartford, 
at the time of which we speak, which has not already 
been noted in connection with other topics, save that 
which relates to defence. The Indians in and around 
the town, though generally friendly, were many of 
them thievish, and at times menacing. Bands too of 

* The computation in the text includes all incapacitated by idiocy or dis- 
ease of any description, as well as those who from other causes do not know 
how to read and write. 



ITS FIRST ORGANIZATION. 57 

marauding Mohawks or Pequots, hostile in their dis- 
position, would occasionally appear and create alarm. 
It was necessary therefore to keep up a constant 
watch. Their chief positions were on Centinel Hill 
at the corner in North Main Street near Messrs Tut- 
tle's store — in South Main Street just below the South 
Congregational Church — and on Charter Oak Hill. It 
is tradition that the locations of the sentries at Tut- 
tle's corner, and below the Church mentioned, were in 
two elm trees, now remembered by many inhabitants, 
within the crotches of each of which sentry-boxes 
were placed, so that the watch could easily communi- 
cate by signals, and distinctly see the flash of a pistol, 
from one end of the town to the other. Every male 
inhabitant over sixteen years of age, with exceptions 
in favor of certain magistrates and of Church officers, 
was to take his turn as watchman. A guard besides, 
with arms fixed, and two charges at least of powder 
and shot, were to attend " upon every publique meet- 
ing for religious use." They were to be free from other 
wardings, to have seats provided for them near the 
Meeting- House door, and were to have in their em- 
ploy two servants, one of whom was to act as " sente- 
nall every meeting." Besides all these precautions, it 
was forbidden to any man to " trade with the natives 
or Indians any peece or pistoll or gunn or powder or 
shott." It was deemed dangerous to supply Indians 
with weapons so formidable. They were " mortal en- 
gines whose rude throats" — " nearer, clearer, deadlier" 
in their notes than whizzing arrows — were prudently 
reserved for the white man's use alone. It is not 
probable, in the first settlement of our town, that their 



58 HARTFORD. 

roar often " opened" in the clang of conflict with any 
sons of the forest. 

A few words now on the first religious organization 
of Hartford. This was purely Congregational, and 
we may add also, purely republican. Non-conform- 
ists all to the liturgy, ceremonies and discipline of the 
Church of England, though firm believers in its faith — 
feeling that the simplicity of the gospel was " marred 
by association with the display of surplices, caps, 
copes and cassocks" — the Settlers claimed the right, 
independently of all external or foreign power, to 
choose and establish their own ministers, to enact 
their own ecclesiastical laws, and exercise their own 
discipline — and so, with a Pastor, Teacher, Ruling 
Elder, and Deacons, for officers, in a Meeting-House 
which those who preceded Hooker and his party 
had already erected, they started the first systema- 
tized Church of God in this then "wilderness town." 
Their Deacons were as deacons now, but their Pastor 
and their Teacher were somewhat peculiar in their 
functions. Exhortation chiefly was the duty of the 
former — it was his province to work on the will and 
the affections. The latter was the Doctor in ecclesia, 
as he was styled — it was his province to teach, explain 
and defend the doctrines of Christianity. The Rul- 
ing Elder, who was ordained with all the solemnity of 
a Pastor or Teacher, was " to assist in the government 
of the church, to watch over all its members, to pre- 
pare and bring forward all cases of discipline, to visit 
and pray with the sick, and, in the absence of the 
Pastor and Teacher, to pray with the congregation 
and expound the Scriptures." The views of the Set- 



ITS FIRST ORGANIZATION. 59 

tiers on ordination, baptism, the atonement, on Chris- 
tian duties, on repentance, on ecclesiastical power and 
discipline, their solemn mode of Covenanting, their 
imposing Confession of Faith avouching "the Lord 
Jehovah, Father, Son and Holy Ghost to be their Sov- 
ereign Lord and Supreme Good," will receive no com- 
ment at our hands. We are, we frankly concede, " in 
school-divinity not able," nor is our heart, perhaps, 
precisely attuned to the task. We have assigned it 
therefore, with his consent, to the charge of a gentle- 
man peculiarly fitted to perform it, on whom, in view 
of his long, useful and unaffected life of piety as a 
Congregational clergyman, the mantle of Hooker may 
be said to have fallen, and to be worn with grace and 
dignity.* 

Yet we cannot dismiss this topic without paying our 
tribute to the fidelity, integrity and zeal, at its com- 
mencement, of the first church in Hartford. It pro- 

* We refer to Rev. Dr. Thomas Robbins, now the Librarian of the Con- 
necticut Historical Society. Perhaps he will think it was our province to 
speak of the Tithing-man, since the duty of this officer — that of taking care 
of " boys playing or misbehaving in or out and around the meeting-house" — 
was more civil than religious in its character. But we confess to a great 
aversion towards this functionary. We have an unpleasant memory of one, 
a tall, strong, most demure-looking personage, who, in our boyhood, once 
screwed our right ear between his bony fingers till it almost gushed blood — 
and all because we laughed a little louder, and with less impediment than the 
rest of the congregation, when one of the catguts of a bass-viol snapped 
asunder, with a loud and ludicrous twang, in the midst of a grave "Hallelu- 
jah." We commit the Tithing-man gladly to you, Doctor! Don't speak well 
of him, pray, if you can help it ! Especially forbear to trace him back to the 
good old Saxon times of King Alfred ! We would not have him legitimated 
for the world ! 

[Since the preceding was written, the Doctor has accomplished the task 
suggested. We hope he will give the public the benefit of his labor. Ed.] 



60 HARTFORD. 

moted piety, good morals and knowledge in an emin- 
ent decree — and this too, without that severity and 
bitterness of doctrinal disputation, which afterwards, 
it must be conceded, characterized it at times, and 
which served, soon after Mr. Hooker's death, to stir up 
the pools of uncharitableness, and split the town in 
twain. But hardly an act of vice or immorality de- 
formed the first stage of our existence as a town — a 
fact to be attributed in great part to the influence of a 
religion happily administered. Though the ministry 
were " weighty and abundant in prayer," their voices 
seem to have fallen on hearts sweetly attuned to the 
notes of supplication. Though they kept in public 
and in private numerous fasts, abstinence from food 
seems never to have dulled their appetite for religious 
meditation. Though they compelled all to "go to 
meeting," even this pious despotism generated no re- 
bellion. Though they laboriously and almost daily 
seasoned the little ones of their Hock with the condi- 
ment of what afterwards formed the Catechism of 
Westminster,* " Larger and Shorter," yet the children 
do not seem to have disrelished the banquet. If they 
refused to wear the canonical square cap, the scholar's 
gown, priest-like, the tippet and the linen surplice, 

* Mr. Hooker, together with Mr. Davenport and Mr. Cotton, of New En- 
gland, were invited to sit in that famous Assembly of Divines which convened 
at Westminster, London, in 1642, and gave to the Christian world the famous 
digests, referred to in the text, of religious faith and practice. Mr. Hooker, 
quotes his biographer from Hutchinson, " did not like the business, and 
thought it not a sufficient call, to go a thousand leagues to confer about mat- 
ters of church government." Being a pure Congregationalist, he was a little 
afraid, doubtless, that the Assembly would be too deeply imbued with Pres- 
byterianism. 



ITS FIRST ORGANIZATION. 61 

something must be allowed to their memory of the 
Council Table, the Star Chamber, and the Court of 
High Commissions. It is certain that, though they 
kept not " the unity of apparel," they kept the unity 
of faith — and as they stood before their Maker in sim- 
ple attire, with white neckcloths, and broad, white, 
pendent bands, or perhaps, like Davenport, with dark, 
cross-barred hoods interlacing with their locks of hair, 
the good God, we doubt not, listened to their cry as 
freely and mercifully as if they had been habited in 
all the ecclesiastical " decencies" of the land from 
which they had fled. At all events, he blessed them 
in their beginning. 

Thus much on the civil and religious organization 
of Hartford when it started upon its career as a town. 
It is worthy of remark that there are scarce any mu- 
nicipal principles operating daily with us now which 
may not be traced back to this primitive period. Mod- 
ified they were, sometimes singularly, by circumstan- 
ces. This is to be expected — was necessary. But 
there they were among the Settlers, and here they are 
now among us — working out all those grand and 
beautiful results which, each day and hour and min- 
ute, gladden our eyes and hearts. We have each our 
due share of republican power — so had the first Set- 
tlers. Though they came here nominally under the 
jurisdiction of Massachusetts, it was soon discovered 
that they were beyond it — and the old Bay State nev- 
er got one aid or subsidy, neither scutage, hydage or 
talliage, first-fruit or tenth, fish or fowl, waif or estray, 
not even a pepper-corn, in token of municipal fealty 
from Hartford ! We exercise our civil power through 



62 HARTFORD. 

the organism of an Assembly — so did the Settlers — 
by means of functionaries of our own choice — so did 
they. We are fully protected in life, limb, property 
and reputation — so were they. We are fully encour- 
aged in social and industrial activity — so were they. 
We can acquire, exchange, accumulate in security and 
in hope, and lay up for our families, for old age, and 
our biers — so could they. We receive for our children 
the boon of education — so did they. We are hedged 
in conservatively by walls of good morals — so were 
they. We breathe, in short, an atmosphere of liberty, 
labor, virtue and religion. So did they. 

ScJEVA. 



Jartfcrlr. 



ITS FIRST MILITARY ORGANIZATION. 



No. 7. 



" Civil governments, in their first institutions, are voluntary associations 
for mutual defence." Gibbon. 

" If we desire to avoid insult, we must be able to repel it; if we desire to 
secure peace, it must be known that we are at all times ready for war." 

Wash ington. 



Anglo-Saxon like, the Settlers of Hartford at once 
established a militia, and their idea of its organization 
and purpose was fundamentally republican. It recog- 
nized the right of resistance and self-preservation in 
all cases in which the sanctions of society and the 
laws are found insufficient to restrain the violence of 
oppression — and not only guaranteed, but practically 
enforced that great protective right which figures so 
conspicuously in all free constitutions, and is the ef- 
fective check to assumption and arbitrary power, the 
jight of the people to keep and bear arms. No stand- 
ing army in time of peace as a body distinct from the 
people — they designed it not. No camp or barracks 
and fortresses to be kept up, at enormous expense, for 
the separate life of men bred exclusively to the profes- 



64 HARTFORD. 

sion of arms, to afford to ambitious and unprincipled 
rulers the ready means of subverting liberty, and 
trampling on human rights — the Settlers would have 
none of this. No inconvenient and perilous billetings 
of soldiers upon the people in time of peace, the ready 
resort of despotic power — they abominated this, and 
with memories, many of them, freshened by bitter ex- 
perience in the Old World. But in their intent the 
citizen and the soldier were to be united — the hearth 
and the camp were in this view to join their blaze — 
and a militia, well ordered and patriotic, was to act 
solely for the safeguard and defence of their little 
community. 

With a few exceptions then, in favor of certain 
magistrates and church officers, every male person be- 
tween the ages of sixteen and sixty was to perform 
military duty once a month — was to keep his arms, 
subject to inspection, always in a serviceable state, 
and to have in his house, in readiness, two pounds of 
powder and twenty bullets of lead. Default of ap- 
pearance on parade was punished by a fine of five 
shillings, default in arms by a fine of one shilling, the 
total want of arms by being " bounde over to answer 
it at the next Corte," and the failure of either powder 
or bullets by a fine of ten shillings. 

The militia was embodied in what was called, and 
long known in our history as the Train-Band. This 
Band was composed properly one-third of Pikemen, 
and two-thirds of Musketeers, the tallest men being 
always selected for the former soldiery, and those 
lowest in stature assigned to the latter. Pikes were 
deemed the more honorable arms, as being most an- 



ITS FIRST MILITARY ORGANIZATION. 



65 



cient, and because the military standard was carried 
at their head. Their bearers, conspicuous for height 
and carriage as well as for dignity of position in the 
ranks, would naturally excite envy but for the quaint 
military rule of the day, that " Gentlemen of the Pikes 
and Gentlemen of the Musketeers should go hand in 
hand in love like dear Brothers, and neither of them 
should envy each other" — a rule which was persua- 
sively urged by the consideration that " in so doing 
God would give a blessing to their undertakings." 
Their duties, as private soldiers of each class, were 
carefully laid down in treatises of the day, and have 
in no way been improved upon since. They were to 
be "very active, not slothful or idle," and to inform 
themselves, through their officers, " of the true use 
and handling of their arms, always keeping them neat, 
clean and well fixed." They were to avoid all quar- 
relling, mutinies, swearing, cursing or lying, and be 
content with their wages. They were to be " good 
husbands in the managing of their means," to keep 
• themselves handsome in their apparel, to avoid drunk- 
enness and all manner of gaming, and were likewise 
" truly to serve and fear God, be obedient to all the 
commands of their superiors, cheerfully go on upon 
all duties, and to be loving, kind and courteous unto 
each other." The best of them were always selected 
for File-Leaders, those who were " able, willing and 
ready to teach the Files." 

The officers of a Train-Band were a Captain, Lieu- 
tenant, Ensign, and Sergeants. The Captain, accord- 
ing to the military theory of the day, one admirably 
applicable in all time, was to know well all martial 
9 



66 



HARTFORD. 



duties, to behave himself courageously and wisely, to 
be temperate, to have " a fatherly care" over his sol- 
diers, " to teach them how to fight upon all occasions," 
and, if in battle, to lead them up first against the ene- 
my, " cheerfully animating them to fall on." The 
Lieutenant was to be a good, just and able soldier, 
skilled in the duty of a Captain, and frequent in exer- 
cising the Company "in all their military motions, 
skirmishings and firings in the pan." The Ensign 
was to be " a proper man, grave, valiant and discreet, 
and well skilled in the postures of the pike," as well 
as " in all the lofty figures of the displaying of the 
colors above the head." He was to know how grace- 
fully " to vail his colors," when a General, or "any 
such man of worth," should pass by, and was, in con- 
test, " to stick by his colors, and not to stir from them 
at such a time, although he should hazard his last 
drop of blood, or make them his winding-sheet." The 
Sergeants, usually from two to four in number accord- 
ing to the size of the Company, were to know how to 
teach all " to handle their arms in a handsome and 
serviceable way," to be " helpful to their Captain or 
other superior officer," to provide the Company with 
ammunition, matches and other materials, and in time 
of skirmishing to see that the Musketeers presented 
"all even abrest, with their matches all cockt, giving 
fire all together in good order, and falling off and ral- 
lying again in the rear of their own Divisions." Be- 
sides the functionaries now mentioned, each Train- 
Band had its Clerk, and Drummers — no fifers at first. 
The former was to keep the Muster-roll and the Pay- 
roll — he was to be "very just and honest." The 



ITS FIRST MILITARY ORGANIZATION. 67 

Drummers, at least two in number, usually three or 
four, were to be skilled in beating the several Points 
of War — named the first a Call, the second a Troop, 
the third a March, the fourth a Preparative, the fifth a 
Battle or Charge, the sixth a Retreat, besides the Re- 
veille and the Tattoo. In theory also, it was deemed 
expedient that they should be " good Linguists, in re- 
spect that sometimes they might be sent into an ene- 
my's camp for the ransoming of prisoners." 

Such in theory was the constitution of a Train- 
Band. It was that of the first military company of 
Hartford, as well as of the first military companies in 
all the early towns of our State. Let us see now 
how it was equipped. 

With muskets and pikes chiefly, as the terms ap- 
plied to the two kinds of soldiers comprising the Band 
imply. They had no ordnance at first — this came at 
a later period. The muskets were of the old match- 
lock variety, with Bandoleers* and Rests. f A match, 
usually made of tow slightly twisted in three strands, 
and a scouring stick, were of course indispensable to 
the Musketeers. The Pikemen usually bore half- 



* Bandoleers were wooden cases answering to our modern cartridge-boxes, 
and were covered with leather. They were made to contain each a charge of 
powder, or of powder and ball, and were worn by each Musketeer, usually 
twelve in number, suspended on a shoulder belt or collar. 

•fThe Rest was a stick, small like a cane, and forked at one end for the 
musket to rest in when aim was taken, with a string attached to it so that it 
could be tied to the wrist. It was used as a cane also, to aid in marching. 
The customary orders, "join your Rest to the outside of your musket — pre- 
sent upon your Rest — take your musket off the Rest — take your Rest into 
your right hand, clearing the string from your left wrist — lay down your 
Rest" — these orders plainly indicate the use of the Rest. 



68 



HART FORD, 



pikes, which were " ten foote in length at least in the 
wood," and were pointed with spears. In addition to 
their pikes, they wore also swords with belts. Half- 
pikes, sometimes called Leading-Staffs, and swords, 
were also generally carried by officers. In addition to 
the arms now stated, the Train-Band soldiers of Hart- 
ford carried also at times, in any emergency of war, 
pistols and daggers. They wore corslets, and coats 
basted with cotton-wool, made proof against Indian 
arrows. As to their apparel otherwise we can judge 
but little about it, save that if consonant with the mil- 
itary requisition of the period, it must have been " neat 
and handsome" as circumstances would allow. We 
have no doubt that they appeared on parade in their 
best cloth and cotton suits of the day, in coats and 
jackets, and breeches of shag-cotton and coarse linen, 
of linsey-woolsey, and kersey and serge, in hats or 
caps their best, but sometimes of skin, and consorting 
with doublets made from the leather of bucks and 
calves. Neither the old hats, or old-colored hats, or 
short coats made of domic, or old grey breeches, 
which we see sometimes noticed in their old invento- 
ries, nor the coats they sometimes wore, made from 
the raccoon, the cat, the fox and the shaggy bear, fig- 
ured often, we think, on parade — because it was 
deemed the duty of an ingenious soldier " not to come 
slovenly habited when he should march forth with his 
Captain," but then particularly to use apparel "for 
his better grace and becoming." 

As to their military exercises, certainly here there 
was very great variety — and on overlooking the treat- 
ises of the day, those particularly which in the old 



ITS FIRST MILITARY ORGANIZATION. 69 

country, as at the Artillery and Military Gardens of 
London, and the private meetings of Townsditch and 
Cripplegate, were deemed of the highest authority in 
the art-military, and which furnished to the New as 
well as the Old World its first and recognized lessons 
on the management of Train-Bands^ we are satisfied 
that in the diversity and complexity of the combina- 
tions they describe, no modern treatises can surpass 
them. Facings, doublings, the inversion and conver- 
sion of ranks and files, marches and countermarches, 
wheelings, firings, the figures of battle with their re- 
ducements, all these with their endless subdivisions, 
with their countless openings and closings of ranks 
and files, and particularities of distance and order, 
and dignities of place, and phrases of command, had 
their application to single Train-Bands as well as to 
regiments and armies. They were varied, and minute, 
and exact enough to challenge the application and 
test the skill of the most ardent and studious of sol- 
diers. And we wonder not, in view of their intricacy 
and extent, that Captain Mason was specially charged 
by order of the General Court, a little while subse- 
quently to the period upon which we dwell, to train 
the 'unskilful' of Hartford, as well as of Windsor 
and Wethersfield, oftener than once a month, if ne- 
cessary. 

Yet the simple postures and charges of the pike 
were not very numerous or difficult. To raise them, 
to open them to closest order and to order, to ad- 
vance, shoulddr, port, comport, cheeke and trail them, 
and to charge to the front, right, left and rear — these 
were the ordinary commands for their management. 



70 HARTFORD. 

The postures of the musket and its appendages were 
more numerous. To order, rest, poise and shoulder 
this arm, to balance it and the Rest on the right side 
with the barrel upwards, and on the left side with the 
barrel downwards, trailing the Rest, to recover it and 
perform the sentinel-posture, and from this to perform 
the funeral-posture, to open, clear, prime and shut the 
pan, to find and open the charge, to charge, to draw, 
cock and fit the match, to present upon the Rest, and 
give fire breast-high — these were the familiar com- 
mands in the management of the musket. The con- 
formities of postures between the muskets and the 
pikes were also matters of careful attention in a Train- 
Band — as the musket shouldered to the pike shoul- 
dered, the former porting to the latter porting, the 
musket poised to the pike advanced, the former re- 
versed to the latter trailing, the former rested to the 
latter cheeked, and the former presented to the latter 
charged. 

The officers and soldiers then of the first military 
company in Hartford, it is obvious, had enough to do 
in the matter of discipline. We should like to see 
them just now, in their garb and arms of more than 
two centuries ago, drawn up in front of our State 
House, or marching through Main Street. We think 
we can — and enable our Readers to see them too — 
through the politeness of Lieutenant Colonel Richard 
Elton, a decidedly venerable gentleman, who one hun- 
dred and eighty-three years ago wrote "the compleat 
Body of the Art-Military," and who, after having be- 
queathed the work for a while to the possession of 
Benjamin Webb, and of John Adams the grandfather 



ITS FIRST MILITARY ORGANIZATION. 71 

of the second President of the United States,* has 
kindly loaned it to us by the hands of E. Smith, Esq., 
of this city. In the representation we propose, we 
shall employ types for soldiers, p standing for Pike- 
men, m for Musketeers, C for Captain, L. for Lieuten- 
ant, E for Ensign, S for Sergeant, with numerals to 
mark the first, second, third, and fourth, and D for 
Drummers. We will first draw the Train-Band vip in 
a favorite Stand. The Captain has ordered the Pike- 
men to the right, the left half-ranks of Musketeers to 
face to the left, and then to march and interchange 
ground, facing afterwards to their leaders, and closing 
files inward to order. They will then appear as un- 
derneath, the Pikemen flanked by the Musketeers. 
Look at them ! 

C 

SI E 4S 

mmmmmmmmDDppppppppDDmmmmmmmm 

mmmmmmmm PPPPPPPP mmmmmmmm 

mmmmmmmm PPPPPPPP mmmmmmmm 

mmmmmmmm PPPPPPPP mmmmmmmm 

mmmmmmmm PPPPPPPP mmmmmmmm 

mmmmmmmm PPPPPPPP mmmmmmmm 
S3 L 2S 

We will next marshal them, as they are tired of 
standing and love exercise, in their favorite Long- 
March. See them, through our typifyers, with their 

* So we are informed. The following handwriting appears on a blank leaf 
in the end of the volume to which reference is made. "John Adams' Book. 
Boston, March the 30. 1696. bought and paid to brother Benjamin Webb for 
the other half of this Book and the whole is now mine, p me John Adams." 



72 



HARTFORD. 



pikes and muskets shouldered, their colors flying and 
drums beating, with bold port and martial frown, and 

"Free bom thoughts which league the soldier with the law-," 



moving with 

C 

mmmm 

mmmm 

D 

mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 

1 S 

mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 

E 

P P P P 

P P P P 
D 



measured tread along Main Street! 

Don't they look well ? How 
many of your grandfathers, gen- 
erations back, Reader, can you 
discern among them? Don't you 
wish we had their portraits for 
the above representation, instead 
of these types that make them 
look so all alike ? The first 
Trail i -Band of Hartford though, 
we think you will acknowledge, 
might have presented a handsome 
appearance — and not only hand- 
some but also formidable! The 
Pequots found it so in about two 
years after it was formed ! It ex- 
terminated the foe ! And the 
Narragansets found it so — and 
all enemies to the infant Com- 
monwealth of Connecticut would 
have found it so ! Our present 
Governor, one of the most ac- 
complished soldiers in the State, 
could he have led it in Mexico, 
would have headed it, we believe, 
in pride, even though composed, 
as it undoubtedly was, of ram- 
pant Whigs, and would not have 



ITS FIRST MILITARY ORGANIZATION, 



73 



envied the glory of even its hum- 
blest private, had the hand of the 
latter, instead of his Excellency's 
own brave arm, struck down the 
hostile banner of Chepultepec ! 
Thanks to the Settlers of Hart- 
ford that they looked at once and 
wisely to a system for defence — 
that they constituted the citizen- 
soldier, honored him with respect, 
endeared him by affection, and 
threw over his art the chastening, 
restraining, and encouraging influ- 
ences of religion and law ! Con- 
necticut has deep reason, in view 
of their efforts and those of sister 
towns, in forming and disciplining Train-Bands, to be 
grateful. Their influence has been felt, oh in how 
many desperate yet triumphant struggles for liberty ! 
We were royal subjects. We are, thanks to the 
Train-Band power, free ! 

Sceva. 



mmmm 

mmmm 

D 

mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 

3S 

mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 
mmmm 
L 



10 



§;uif0rlL 



ITS FIRST BURYING-GROUND. 



No. 8. 



" Dull grave, thou spoilst the dance of youthful blood," &c. 

Young — when melancholy. 

" Why start at Death? Where is he? Death arrived 
Is past; not come, or gone, he's never here." 

Young — more cheerful. 

Room for the dead! So from time immemorial 
saith both Pagan and Christian ! How else be sure 
of your body when the soul, after its transmigrations 
of three thousand years, shall return to occupy again 
its tenement of clay, exclaimed the old Egyptian. 
How else, said the Greek and the Roman, reach the 
Elysian Fields — the body unburied, your soul must 
wait for its blessedness one hundred years. How 
else, reasons the savage, will you feed and clothe the 
disembodied spirit in the other world? You must 
leave implements of the chase and dishes of food by 
the body in some shallow tabernacle of earth, and 
hang some of its garments to sway in the wind upon 
some neighboring tree. How else, reasoned the an- 
cient Hebrew, guard your deceased friend from the 
approach of the Evil One ? In the earth, within his 



76 



HARTFORD. 



coffin, you must with his bent thumb figure the name 
of God, that you may say to him in confidence, as 
you turn his face towards heaven, " Go in peace !" 
How else, says the unsuperstitious Christian, guard 
against the corruptions of clay, impress the solemn 
lesson of man's mortality, and affectionately memo- 
rialize the departed ? " Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, 
dust to dust" — and 



" At the piping of fill hands, 

When the judgment signal's spread — 

When the islands and the lands, 

And the seas give up their dead, 
And the south and the north shall come ; 

When the sinner is betrayed, 

And the just man is afraid, 

Then Heaven be the aid 

Of the dead!"* 

Such, the Christian, were the solemn sentiments of 
the Hartford Settlers upon death and burial. And 
they acted upon them without parade — with a sober 
simplicity which had at least this merit, that it did 
not mock the grave. To wash the body, to dress it 
in a shroud,f to place it in a plain coffin — to assem- 



*Brainard — slightly varied in the last two lines. 

t We should prefer to see the dead dressed in their coffins as in their lives, 
handsomely and characteristically. There is enough awful about death with- 
out the addition of that ugly, horrifying and in fact unmeaning shroud — 
enough painfully attractive both to memory and to hope to require the relief 
of pleasant associations — and what one more pleasant than that which arises 
from dressing the dead in their wonted attire, made specially neat and grace 
ful for their last appearance — so that they may look as if they were not go- 
ing to leave us — instead of dressing them as we do now, with nothing on hard- 
ly but their skins— almost like the beasts that perish, that we dig a careless 
hole for and toss in. Pope, in our judgment, though he treats the subject a 
little lightly, makes Narcissa in her last moments give to her maid an excel- 



ITS FIRST BURYIIVG-GROUND. 77 

ble, to pray and sing a mournful tune — to bear to the 
grave, sometimes to the House of God first for servi- 
ces and then to the grave, on some dark litter — the 
Train-Band often escorting if the deceased was a 
soldier, with black feathers or ribbons on their hats, 
and their colors stripped from the staff and tied about 
the waist of their standard-bearer, and their drums 
covered with black bays — to utter a little epitome 
over the grave — to pray and sing again — to lower the 

lent direction, be it or not, as the poet designs it to be, the expression of a 
ruling passion strong in death. 

" Odious ! in woolen ! t'would a saint provoke, 
(Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke.) 
No, let a charming chintz and Brussels lace 
Wrap my cold limbs, and shade my lifeless face ! 
One would not, sure, be frightful when one's dead — 
And, Betty, give this cheek a little red." 

We have no hope, however, of changing our burial practice, nor shall we 
assume in regard to it the task of a Reformer. We trust, for one however, 
to be buried in no unmanly, effeminating night-gown, but in a full citizen's 
dress ! And so we put this our wish on record, as a guide to our Undertaker. 

[What high sanction has been given to Screva's suggestion in the above 
note by the manner in which, lately, the remains of the immortal Webster 
were coffined ! A letter in the New York Times, written from Marshfield by 
one who was present at the funeral of the illustrious statesman, says : " The 
corpse is arrayed in such habiliments as his compeers of the Senate have often 
seen him in, when on a bright Summer morning he sought the Senate Hall, 
to pour the words of wisdom and the light of truth upon some topic of sur- 
passing public interest. A blue coat, with plain gilt buttons, vest and pants 
of spotless white, are substituted for the shroud. A white neckcloth encir- 
cles the throat, over which is turned the shirt collar. The feet are encased in 
silken hose and shoes of patent leather. The hair of the deceased is parted 
and disposed as hi life; and his white-gloved hands are crossed upon his 
breast. The lips are slightly parted, just as when about to speak. How fit- 
ting is the appearance of these remains ! They seem, indeed, to sleep but for 
an hour; and their habiliments, though prepared for the grave, still suggest 
life, and feed the lingering imagination which would reanimate the helpless 
clay." Ed.] 



78 



HARTFORD, 



coffin — to fire, if over a soldier, three volleys — to cov- 
er the coffin, mound it, and put the event, through 
their ministers, to spiritual use the next Sunday or 
Lecture Day — such were their simple customs and 
rites. What would they have thought of many of 
the funeral affectations of the present day — of that 
French nobleman Brumoi for instance, who on the 
death of his mot her, put his park into mourning, 
craped his deer, put black ii si i in his ponds, and car- 
ried several barrels of black ink from Paris to supply 
his jets d'eaux! They would have told him, we 
think, that all his contrived blackness was but the 
type of that real one which would be sure to envel- 
ope himself and his folly in the world hereafter. A 
plain-spoken people were these Settlers ! In funeral 
rites far removed too from every superstition, as well 
as every affectation! For them no heathen Styx! 
A godly people that they were^we do not suppose the 
course of their departed souls often lay that way. 
Charon surely was no Ferryman for an enlightened 
Puritan — nor Pope Adrian the Eighth either ! But 
with Christ for a guide, his simple doctrines for a 
panoply, and immortal hope to wing their flight, their 
souls, after they had " shuffled off this mortal coil," 
started through pure, empyrean air, we think, for that 
world 

" untravelled by the sun, 
Where Time's far wandering tide has never run" — 

leaving the bodies they had volatilized on earth to be 
immured in white oak or pine boxes, roofed or plain 
at the top, as funereal fancy dictated, and to be depos- 



ITS FIRST BURYING-GROUND. 79 

ited in the manner we have described, in solemn 
keeping, at the corner of present Market Street and 
State House Square. 

Yes, Reader, there was the site of the first Burying- 
Ground of Hartford — an area close by the first Meet- 
ing-House, and running north from the Square to- 
wards the present City Hall, and west from present 
Market Street up, a little distance, the hill. It was 
then much more elevated than now — ten to twelve 
feet. It has been cut down since, low enough to car- 
ry away all the dust both of the bodies and coffins of 
those who slept in its cold embrace. Its monuments, 
many of them, as they stood upon the site, were well 
remembered and frequently spoken of to his sons by 
the father of Messrs J. B. and C. Hosmer of this city, 
and also by the late Samuel Olcott. The latter said 
that many of the stones composing them were used 
in laying the foundations of some of the oldest build- 
ings fronting on the Square, on its north side. 

But they are gone to our view — and the Settlers 
have transmitted to us none of their mummied bodies 
' loaded with biography.' We have not even the 
name of a solitary one of those who were buried 
there. Their dust, distinguished or undistinguished 
in its day, is undistinguishable now. It is plain how- 
ever, from the customs and economy of the time, that 
those who first died in Hartford, did not retire to any 
resting-places that were made splendid with gravelled 
walks, and terraces and flowery banks, and costly 
trees and shrubs, like those of Mount Auburn, Green- 
wood, and our own North Cemetery — least of all to 
any magnificent villas like those of Pere la Chaise. 



80 HARTFORD. 

They were not laid up for eternity on shelves either 
of marble or of stone. No heaps of granite or of 
bronze, of lime or freestone, pedantic with inscriptions 
and chiselled with the exquisiteness of art — no pomp- 
ous urns, or pyramids, or statues — no Winged Angels 
or Victories, wrought as if to make one think that 
" Hymen and Cupid, and not Death, walked through 
the Yard" — figured in Hartford's primitive Burying- 
Ground. But a few simple, upright stones, with 
plain inscriptions, and never any double Christian 
names — this would have been deemed a great innova- 
tion — possibly one or two somewhat massive slabs 
supported by five pillars on a foundation of stone, 
such as arc seen now in old Grounds — these were the 
simple memorials erected over the graves of our first 
Settlers. 

The turf was green above these graves. It may 
also have been smooth, for the Town, judging from 
its subsequent practice in this respect, allowed horses 
and calves to feed upon its herbage. Yet there was a 
neat and ' sufficient' fence around, with pales and 
post heads ' handsomely shaped,' both for ornament, 
and to keep out the swine. Affection may have dec- 
orated some of the mounds, and doubtless did, with 
little shelters of shrubbery, with fern and woodbine 
and jessamine — there was plenty of these plants in 
the woods around. It may have strewn chaplets, and 
wreaths of flowers, over youth and innocence and 
beauty. It may have planted the cypress, the willow 
and the hemlock. But adornment was all simple, 
save that which nature perhaps furnished in some of 



ITS FIRST BURYING-GROUND. 81 

the stately trees of the time, some gnarled oak, or 
tall whitewood, or majestic pines, through which the 
raven might caw in his plumage of crape, and the 
breezes might sigh, or thunder storms roll their bass, 
or the clouds weep and the spheres play their sweet- 
est harmony, above the sheeted dead. 

Sceva. 



11 



Qiir 



artfarlL 



ITS NAME. A COAT OF ARMS. 
No. 9. 



" What's in a name?" 

Shakspeare. 

" Good name dear my lord, 

Is the immediate jewel." 

Shakspeare, in reply. 

"Every man of the children of Israel shall pitch by his own standard, with 
the ensign of their father's house; far off about the tabernacle of the congre- 
gation shall they pitch." 

Numbers, chap. ii. v. 2. 

"Whitsunday has arrived — it is time to baptize the 
town ! We have kept it for some time in swaddling 
clothes, manly infant though it was. We have con- 
tinued it awhile as a catechumen. This was proper. 
The settlement should have had time to open its eyes, 
to stretch its limbs, to grow a little, and give signs of 
civil regeneration and municipal grace, ere it could be 
taken to the baptistry of the General Court, and 
formally receive the rite of lay-baptism. In its mere 
babyhood, its parents called it from its transitory 
mother in Massachusetts — "Newtown" — but they soon 
grew tired of the name of the Bay State widow, 



84 



HARTFORD. ITS NAME. 



and February 21st, 1636, Mr. Ludlowe, Mr. Steele, 
Mr. Swaine, Mr. Phelps, and Mr. Westwood, laid 
their legislative hands upon it, and called it "Harte- 
ford." This was the name of the town in England 
in which Samuel Stone was born, and seems to have 
been adopted in commemoration of the fact. Why 
Chelmsford, the birthplace of Mr. Hooker, was not 
selected, or the name of soiue other town in which 
some of the most distinguished of the Settlers were 
born, is nowhere apparent. Probably Mr. Stone and 
his friends were most active in the baptism. 

At any event a good and an honorable name was se- 
lected. Hartford in England, now called Hertford, 
was the leading town of a shire called after itself, as 
is our own town now. It lies on the river Lea, rela- 
tively as Hartford here on the river Connecticut, and is 
twenty-one miles north of London. It is a town very 
considerable for its antiquity. The East- Saxon kings 
often kept their courts there. Its burgesses were of 
note in the time of William the Conqueror. A re- 
markable and expensive cell for the monks of St. 
Albans figured early among its curiosities. King 
Edward the elder erected a castle* there, just in the 
forks of the Y-shaped town, and the famous John of 
Gaunt, afterwards Duke of Richmond, received it 
subsequently from the hands of Edward the Third, 
" together with the Town and Honour of Hartford, 



*A picture of this castle, as it appeared in 1772, with angular towers, one 
of which supports the gable of a dwelling-house built on the wall, may be 
seen in volume second of Grose's Antiquities of England and Wales. 



A COAT OF ARMS, 85 

that there he might keep a house suitable to his qual- 
ity, and have a decent habitation."* 

But the feature which interests us now most, and 
we trust it will our Readers, is an heraldic one. Our 
own Hartford must have its Coat of Arms ! It is en- 
titled to one. Not to the arms of Dominion — we 
want no lions-rampant or fleurs-de-lis to mark any 
monarchical sway. Nor to the arms of Pretension — 
we claim no kingdom but our own. Nor to the arms 
of Patronage — we are not, in the sense of the old 
world, either governors of provinces, or lords of man- 
ors, or disposers of benefices. Nor to the arms of 
Family, Alliance, Succession or Concession — we are 
distinguished by no aristocratic superiorities, jurisdic- 
tion, or augmentations of honor. But we are entitled 
to the arms of Community ; to those, in other words, 
which, while they may serve to arouse attractive asso- 
ciations, commemorate pleasant facts of history, and 
inspire warming sentiments, yet specially serve, like a 
seal, to distinguish us as a body corporate or town.f 

*Buckingham's New London Universal Gazetteer, a comparatively recent 
work, contains the following notice of Hertford. "A town, capital of the 
county, with a market on Saturday, on the Lea, which is here navigable for 
barges. It contains two parish churches, a neat sessions house, a town hall, 
a jail and penitentiary house, and a market house. 2* miles on the London 
road stands the E. India College, founded to co-operate with the College at 
Calcutta in training young men for the company's service. It has also a 
school belonging to Christ Church Hospital, London, a grammar school, 2 
meeting-houses for dissenters and 1 for Quakers. It is governed by a mayor, 
high-steward, recorder, aldermen, &c, and sends 2 members to parliament. 
21 m. N of London. Pop. 4,265." 

t We have already a city seal. It was ordered and accepted by the city 
early as 1785. Col. Samuel Wyllys and John Trumbull, Esq., were the Com- 
mittee appointed to form and report it. They reported as follows : 

" That the device for the Seal of the City of Hartford, be as follows — Con- 



86 HARTFORD. ITS NAME. 

Just prepare yourself then, Reader, for what we shall 
have to say on this point, by perusing carefully the 
three following paragraphs. 

Camden, in his Brittania, p. 294, speaking of Hart- 
ford says, that " some will have the name to signifie 
the Red Ford, others the Ford of Harts." The first 
signification is by Camden's Commentator, and by 
other writers, repudiated. The second is the true one. 
We found the name in its original Saxon dress, and 
caused it to be engraved that all might see it as it 
looked when it was born. Here it is, and stout and 
fair to the eye too it appears ! Behold it — 



Heojitpojib! 



In the dress of our day the first two syllables form 
Heort, a word which signifies according to Bailey, " a 
stag five years old." The third syllable is ford, and 
signifies, as is familiar, a place in a river or other wa- 
ter, where it may be passed by man or beast on foot, 
or by wading. Etymologically, then, Hartford clearly 
means the Ford of Harts ! 

necticut River, represented by the figure of an old man, crowned with rush- 
es, seated against a Rock, holding an Urn, with a Stream flowing from it — at 
his feet a net and fish peculiar to the River lying by it, with barrels and bales. 
Over his head an Oak growing out of a cleft in the Rock. Round the whole 
these words — Sigillum Civitatis Hartfordiensis." 

This device is but a modified repetition of old Father Thames. It is that 
old man crowned with rushes, &c, who is the eternal type of all rivers, and 
may as well be applied to every city on a river as to the city of Hertford- 
The fish look like any fish — the nets like all nets. There is nothing distinct- 
ive about the device — nothing localising. 

[The seal spoken of above was soon changed for another designed by 
Scseva, as will be noticed farther on. Ed.] 



A COAT OF ARMS. 87 

Again. The Commentator on Camden, in the 
Brittania, p. 304, speaks of the name Hartford as " no 
doubt took from a Hart, with which one can easily 
imagine such a woody County [as Hartfordshire] to 
have formerly abounded — and the arms of the town 
which (if rightly represented by Spede) are a Hart 
couchant in the water, put it beyond dispute." 

Once more. The author of England Illustrated, an 
elaborate work of high authority, published in London 
in 1764, quotes Dr. Gibson, a celebrated antiquari- 
an, as deriving Hartford " from a Hart, this County, 
[Hartfordshire] having formerly abounded in deer, and 
the arms of the town, as represented by Mr. Speed, 
being a Hart couchant in the water." Thomas Kil- 
chin, Geographer and Engraver to his Royal Highness 
the Duke of York, in a map, ' drawn from the best 
authorities,' which accompanies the work now quot- 
ed, spells both Hartfordshire and Hartford as we spell 
them now, that is with an a instead of an e in the 
first syllable. So also we have seen them spelt on 
other old maps. 

We have then the etymology of Hartford. We 
have the armorial bearing of the old town in England 
from which it is named. Hartford is in Connecticut, 
on the banks of a river and a riveret, crossed in early 
times by thousands of deer that lapped their spark- 
ling waters. Connecticut has its Coat of Arms — 
three grape vines bearing fruit. Connecticut is one of 
the United States of America. The conspicuous em- 
blem of the United States is the Eagle. Remember- 
ing now that armorial bearings are ' honorable in pro- 
portion to their simplicity,' we have taken the simple 



HARTFORD, 



ITS NAME. 



facts just stated, and thoughtfully, in the main in strict 
conformity with heraldic rules, and with the variation 
of a hart fording- — the better aspect in which to pre- 
sent him — instead of lying" upon a stream, have de- 
signed for our fair Town the following Coat of Arms. 

Ar. An American Hart proper, fording- a stream, 
trippant, in fess ; in a Landskip, in middle base, a 
Grape Vine bearing fruit, naissant from a strip of 
earth — all proper. Crest. An American Eagle prop- 
er, displayed. Motto. Post nubila Phoebus. 

Is this Arabic to you, Reader ? Don't be alarmed ! 
We will explain it all soon, so that you shall compre- 
hend it perfectly. But first glance at the design ! * 




* W. H. Dodd Esq., of our city, with a readiness truly laudable, and from 
the motive of "public spirit and not of cash," originally engraved it for us 
on wood. All praise to his courtesy, and to his skill ! 



A COAT OF ARMS 



89 



Glance again if you please, and with a friendly 
eye — for like Sterne, we " would almost go fifty miles 
on foot to kiss the hand of that man [not to say 
woman], whose generous heart will give up the reins 
of his imagination into his author's hands — be pleased 
he knows not why, and cares not wherefore." When 
you shall have taken the edge off from your curiosity, 
then read what we have to say farther ! 



The Escutcheon or Shield of a Coat of Arms, which 
in its form may differ in all countries according to the 
fancy or pleasure of the bearer, is in our Design, it 
will be perceived, nearly heart-shaped. Its field, or in 
other words its surface, which may be of different col- 
ors, is here white. This color is denoted in our heral- 
dic description by the syllable Ar., a contraction for 
Argent, the common French word for silver, of which 
metal all white fields are supposed to consist. The 
adjective proper in heraldry is applied to animals, veg- 
etables, the celestial bodies, &c, when they are paint- 
ed of their natural color. It is applied in the above 
technical description three times, and denotes that the 
bearings or charges on the field, in other words the de- 
vices upon it, and the crest, if painted, should appear 
in their own real and proper hues. Trippant is a term 
used to express a buck, hart, antelope, hind, &c, with 
his right fore-foot lifted up, and the other three feet on 
the ground, as if walking. In f ess denotes any charge 
placed horizontally across the middle of the field, as 

12 



90 HARTFORD. ITS NAME, 

the device of the Hart in the Plate.* Lands/dp de- 
notes the base of an escutcheon when it is painted as 
a field with a tree or a vine, &c, therein. We apply 
it, in description, to a part only of the base, to that 
which is called middle base, or in other words to that 
portion of the bottom part of the shield which, rising 
from its point, lies between its dexter and sinister, 
that is its right and left portions. Charges thereon are 
said to be in middle base. Naissant means arising or 
coming forth. Crest denotes the highest part of the 
ornaments of a Coat of Arms. Displayed is applied 
to any bird of prey with wings extended. Post Nubi- 
la Phcebus means After the clouds the Sun, The fig- 
ure which it fills in the Plate is called the Scroll. The 
other phrases of the heraldic description explain them- 
selves, so that the Reader, familiarizing himself with 
the meaning, as we give it, of the terms purely tech- 
nical, will perfectly understand the whole description. 
The external ornaments of the shield, besides the 
crest and scroll, called in heraldry Floicrishing-s, are 
fanciful. Our aim has been, in conformity with our 
device in other particulars, to make them simple. 

Let us look at the chief emblems of the Coat of 
Arms now, briefly, in an associative aspect. A noble 
Hart, in the pride of his years, with full grown beam 



* A nice critic might here suggest that, as we have two charges, and these 
borne perpendicularly, one above the other, we should describe them as 
blazoned in pale, or paleicays. But as the leading emblem is the Hart, hori- 
zontally placed, and as it occupies a space beyond the limits of the pale 
proper, we have described it as in the text. We have no fear of a " Visita- 
tion" from the " Herald's College" in this day and place. 



A COAT OF ARMS. 91 

and antlers,* figures conspicuously on the face of the 
Plate, and in the very spot which is called in heraldry 
the Heart of the Shield. Innocent, sagacious, grace- 
ful, powerful, swift — with an eye in fact one of the 
most beautiful in the world, ' sparkling, warm and 
sensible' — with all his senses exquisitely acute — most 
delicate in the choice of his pasture — brave in de- 
fence — this splendid animal, made, says Goldsmith, 
" to embellish the forest, and animate the solitudes of 
nature," is in our Design fording a stream such as we 
may conceive our Riveret to have been more than 
two centuries ago. The banks of the stream are 
green and tufted. On one side, the bank, somewhat 
high, is crowned with bushes. Mountains, over- 
topped by trees, are seen in the distance. The Hart, 
unstartled and thoughtful of green pastures, is ap- 
proaching the brink of the stream. Thus then pleas- 
antly associated with noble qualities in one among 
the noblest of animals, as well as with deep and 
grateful memories of our own past, and with a chaste 
etymology — we blazon Hartford ! 

With an extract from our State Coat of Arms — 
one which, commemorating the mournfully sweet his- 
tory of the Founders of our Town and Common- 
wealth, expresses with solemn beauty the wise benef- 
icence of that Almighty Hand which out of Egypt 
brought the vine, and here in the Connecticut valley 
cast out the heathen and planted it, and covered the 

* Copied from the specimen Hart in the " Natural History of New York" — 
a work published under the authority of the State of New York by James E. 
De Kay Esq. 



92 HARTFORD 



ITS NAME. 



hills with its shadow, and stretched out its boughs, 
like goodly cedar trees, unto the river, and its branch- 
es unto the sea, filling the land when it had taken 
root,* — with this imposing, familiar emblem from our 
own State arms, we blazon Connecticut ! 

With the Eagle, bird of empire, whose happy flight, 
with spreading wings untired, is ' highest towards 
heaven' — with this bird of piercing, sparkling eye — 
proud like his own mountain home — magnanimous 
though fierce — bird of unblenched front and noble 
brow — that ever watches the nest it once has plant- 
ed — which, though its plumage is grey with the traces 
of even an hundred years, still nurses its vigorous 
young 

" Strong-pounced, and ardent with paternal fire, 
And fit to raise a kingdom of their own" — 

with this majestic child of the sun " to whom 'tis giv- 
en to guard our banner of the free," standing as the 
crest of our device, we blazon Hartford, Connecticut, 
as belonging to our own " land of the free, and home 
of the brave !" 

The motto, Post Nubila Phoebus — we can speak of 
it freely, as we did not originate, but only newly apply 
it. Is it not rich, poetical, sublime in meaning? How 
true as to Hartford in the past — historically! How 
applicable in all time! The Old World darkly op- 
pressed our Settlers ere they left their home across 

* Psalm 80, w. 8, 9, 10, 11— the origin of our State Coat of Arms. How 
admirably pertinent here this couplet from Pope — 

" Man like the gen'rous vine, supported lives, 

The strength he gains is from th' embrace he gives! 



A COAT OF ARMS. 93 

the seas — the New World set them free. After the 
clouds the Sun! Cold and famine frustrated their 
first attempts at settlement — their next succeeded. 
After the clouds the Sun! The startled, vindictive 
savages of our coast threatened them early with de- 
struction, but they were scattered like chaff before the 
wind — and down in the stream of time the tomahawk 
and the scalping-knife were again and often brand- 
ished for the destruction of our town, but the glim- 
mer of these savage weapons faded in the superior 
flash of the pistol and gleam of the pike. After the 
clouds the Sun ! The soil our early Townsmen tilled 
forgot at times to yield its increase — cold and rain sti- 
fled their seeds and fruits — but the friendly Indians 
around them and far at the sources of the Connecti- 
cut husbanded their stock, and made the pale man's 
face of famine to smile. After the clouds the Sun ! 
The Dutch vexed them from the Point — intruded on 
their lands — attempted at times to seize the fort which 
guarded the mouth of the river that floated their com- 
merce — but sequestration made the Point peaceful, 
and bold hearts and a little ordnance preserved the 
fort. After the clouds the Sun ! A tyrant attempted 
to seize and destroy a Charter that protected their 
township — the Instrument was hid triumphantly in 
an Oak. After the clouds the Sun ! A minion of the 
Duke of York attempted in our own Main Street to 
usurp the command of our Train-Band, but fled 
ingloriously away ' dumbed' and deafened by the 
drums and menaces of its brave commander. After 
the clouds the Sun ! French power severely annoyed 
our townsmen in common with all English Colonists, 



94 HARTFORD. ITS NAME, 

but it was annihilated in the New World at the bas- 
tions of Louisburgh. After the clouds the Sun ! 
Again and often subsequently the hand of British 
tyranny lay heavy and sore upon our town liberty — 
in common with sister towns we triumphantly threw 
off its pressure. After the clouds the Sim! Toil, 
difficulty, peril, disappointment, occasionally despair 
even — the lot of all communities — have at various 
times encompassed the path of our town on its jour- 
ney of two hundred and seventeen years — but they have 
seldom long embarassed, never choked our progress. 
From about two hundred we are now eighteen thou- 
sand souls. From a few colonial thousand pounds 
worth of property we have now our millions. From 
a little commerce in -skins, now a commerce various 
almost as human wants, whose merchandise, in heaps 
almost colossal, stares us daily in the face upon our 
wharves, in our vessels, or in our warehouses, our de- 
pots and our cars. Instead of struggling against for- 
eign foes for life and a livelihood, we are now dan- 
dling in the lap of peace, and nursing the useful arts. 
Instead of want we have abundance. The ' hope de- 
ferred' of our first Settlers, is the hope fulfilled, and 
still fulfilling, of our own day. Their wilderness as- 
pirations are onr present garden enjoyments. Though 
thus, in the past, skies have been at intervals dark, 
and tempests have lowered, and the elements burst in 
storm, yet day has been sure to break clear, peaceful 
and radiant, and so in spite of all temporary obstruc- 
tions, if we but act well our part, will continue to 
break, long as time on earth, immortal as hope, and 



A COAT OF ARMS. 95 

sure as the goodness of Heaven. After the clouds the 
Sun ! Let us thank God, and be happy ! 

And now, if our Readers are pleased with the de- 
vice we exhibit, who of the fair ones among them will 
paint one for — Scseva ? Our Publishers will see that 
any such reach their destination, if you please, Ladies. 
Only be sure that they are well done ! Then you'll 
richly deserve a device of arms yourselves ! Suppose, 
by way of compensating you in advance, we contrive 
one for you now — for those of you at least who are 
yet, like Naiads, floating, unanchored, on your sweet 
streams of youth, and beauty and hope. Let us see ! 

We have it ! You shall, in the first place, have a 
pair of arms couped, that is arms taken from the body 
to act representatively, by themselves. These are to 
be impaled on a field of gold bordered with silver, 
interlacing with the arms of some Adonis, whose 
" arched brows," and " hawking eye" and " curls," 
mark him out at once as the handsomest of Support- 
ers to that firmest of Shields, the matrimonial! How 
pretty it would look — such a device — with Cupid for 
a crest, holding in his dexter[ous] hand an arrow en- 
amelled with flowers, and in the other knots of silken 
jesses, and to have blazoned among the bearings little 
Cherubs, winged to show that they are capable of ris- 
ing in the world, and rayed to show that they are 
sunny ! Sit and draw such a design awhile, Ladies, 
on your ' heart's table' — and then draw it on your 
parlor table, on delicate rice paper! But don't forget 
to paint the Hartford Coat of Arms! Thank you! 
" That's a good girl" — each of you ! 

SCJ3VA. 



96 HARTFORD. ITS NAME, 

[Since the publication by Screva of the foregoing article, many compli- 
ments have been paid to his charming and appropriate Coat of Arms. It 
has been adopted by the City of Hartford for the City Seal. It has been en- 
graven on bank notes and cheeques. It embellishes the heading of Insur- 
ance policies, and has been carved and emblazoned on our new and beautiful 
steamer the " City of Hartford." 

The Coat of Arms has also awakened the Muse of Poetry in various quar- 
ters — and from her effusions we select the following — which were originally 
contributed to the Hartford Courant. 



OUR MOTTO. 

" Post Nubila Phoebus'' — the Hart in the stream, 
With his antlers thrown back to the life-giving beam, 
And the Monarch of birds, as he soars through the air, 
The soul of our motto, exultingly bear. 

Our Fathers ! — they toil'd "mid the storm and the foe, 
The seed of a nation in patience to sow, 
While the faith of the Christian engrav'd on their breast 
" Post Nubila P/iabus," and led them to rest. 

We rejoice in the home, where as strangers they trod, 
And with love to our country, and trust in our God, 
Would fain rear a race, of whom history shall say 
" Post Nubila P/iabus," when we pass away. 
Hartford, March, 1851. 



HARTFORD— ITS COAT OF ARMS. 

He is fording the stream, the brave, noble Hart, 
With spirits exulting — not fearing the dart ; 
He knows that before him the pastures are green, 
The birds gay with music, the sun in its sheen — 
He will soon reach the bank — his journey then done, 
Oh proudly he'll tread on the land he has won ! 

Land where the Tine from an " Egypt" is brought, 
That Vine of Religion our Forefathers sought ; 
Its roots do implant the bold, happy and free, 
It shall shadow the earth, and stretch out to the sea! 
God's breath in its tendrils, God's sun on its leaves, 
It will bless for all time the land where it cleaves ! 



A COAT OF ARMS. 97 

The Eagle overlooks from his 'own mountain home,' 

With pinions outstretched, and ready to roam — 

He can speed through the clouds, he can speed through the storm — 

He can speed where the fiercest sun blazons his form — 

He can find the green tree which no tempest can shock — ■ 

He can build his loved nest firm-fixed in the rock ! 

Glorious emblems these are of the way 

Our fathers pressed on in their soul-stirring day ! 

Theirs a stern conflict — theirs a stern strife — 

Ending in death, but yet ending in life. 

They died — but we live — aye ! mark it each one — 

Theirs was the cloud ! — but ours is the Sun.' 

Boston, June, 1851. Laura. 

A word more. The invitation, at the close of the foregoing Article, to the 
'fair ones,' to test their skill in painting the Coat of Arms, was complied 
with most pleasantly. Sea?va received some half dozen pictures of the De- 
sign from as many different sources — one painted in oil, two in water colors, 
and the remainder drawn in pencil. They were beautifully executed, and 
Scaeva desires us, in his behalf, to return his sincere thanks to the fair 
donors. Ed.] 



13 



iptffotlh 



ITS MUNICIPAL ORGANIZATION— DOWN TO 1650. 
No. 10. 
"And find the means proportioned to their end." 



" Nor think thou seest a wild disorder here. 
* * * * To the sight, 

Arrangement neat and chastest order reign." 



rope. 



Young. 



Hartford, Ho ! Again to its history, Readers of 
Screva — because many of you have solicited us to re- 
sume — we would fain oblige — and because the fit of 
writing is upon us, and we cannot easily resist the 
convulsion.* Pleasant it is to us that our former Ar- 
ticles were received with favor. More pleasant it is 
to find, with you Readers, the mind and the heart to 
appreciate, for the sake of its instruction, and as a 
source of just pride, the facts and the sentiments 
which give tongue to the life of our beloved Town in 
the olden time ! 

In our first series of Articles we launched the 
Town. In the series we now propose we shall fol- 

* [An interval of two months and a half elapsed between the publication 
of this and the preceding Article. Ed.] 



100 HARTFORD. 

low it down the stream of time for fifteen years — to 
1650. What we have to say will embrace facts and 
circumstances true within This period, which, for the 
sake of convenience, we shall denominate the First 
Period of the Town, and we shall present its features 
distributed under appropriate heads. The first in or- 
der is that which hangs in capitals over the top of the 
papei structure built for you to-day, the Municipal 
Organization of the Town. Hear us now for our 
cause, and " have patience that you may hear !" 

In the feature then under present consideration, 
Hartford, dining its First Period, made much im- 
provement. Its powers and duties as a township, 
through the double force of its own legislation and 
that of the General Court, became better denned, 
more ample, and more elleetive. Increased security 
was thrown over the character of its population, and 
over rights and property of every description. 

The policy adopted on the first organization of the 
Town with regard to Inhabitants, was steadily pur- 
sued and improved. Good character, an honest life 
and conversation, and the vote of the major part of 
the Town, were still absolutely essential to the admis- 
sion of new citizens. Still vagrants and vicious per- 
sons were excluded from the privileges of settlement. 
Still the sojourn of strangers in families was looked 
upon with jealousy, and by a new precaution their 
entertainment above one month, without leave from 
the Town, exposed their hosts " to be called in ques- 
tion for the same," and to the necessity of discharging 
the Town " from any cost or trouble that might come 



ITS MUNICIPAL ORGANIZATION. 101 

thereby." Whether young unmarried men were still 
compelled, as at first, to secure public permission in 
order to dwell in such families as they pleased, or to 
keep house by themselves, is doubtful. The system 
of the Settlers in this respect, founded, as it seems to 
have been, upon rather too strict a view of wedded 
love as the ' true source of human offspring,' and 
' sole propriety' in the new ' paradise' they were form- 
ing, soon gave way, we are inclined to think, to 
the natural resentment, importunity or independence 
of the bachelors. The implication it carried that 
those ' loveless, joyless, unendeared' members of so- 
ciety, who have never yet chosen " to light their con- 
stant lamp, and wave their purple wings," were inca. 
pable of behaving themselves with propriety, could 
hardly have been borne for any great length of time, 
we think, with patience, and breaches of the Orders 
which consigned them to the particular surveillance of 
the Town, began soon, doubtless, to be winked at by 
the authorities, as we find no renewal or mention of 
these Orders in the Records subsequent to their first 
passage. Still the eye of the Settlers was vigilant, 
keenly so, upon every Inhabitant. Their high sense 
of his duties, of those which devolved upon every cit- 
izen, and their solemn purpose of committing each, 
through the profound and awe-inspiring obligations of 
religious faith, to the due discharge of these duties, is 
strikingly shown in the following Oath of Fidelity — 
which, framed in 1640, by the General Court, was ad- 
ministered during the Period now under considera- 
tion, by any two or three Magistrates, to all male per- 
sons above sixteen years of age, upon a certificate of 



102 HARTFORD. 

good behavior. Read it — and contrasting with it, if 
you please, our present Freeman's oath, mark the far 
superior gravity and significance of the Oath of the 
olden time ! 

" I, A. B. being by the Providence of God an inhabitant within 
"the Jurisdiction of Coneetecott, doc acknowledge myselfe to be 
" subjecte to the Government thereof, and doe sweare by the great 
"and dreadful! name of the everliveing God, to be true and faithfull 
"unto the same, and doe submit boath my person and estate therc- 
" unto, according to all the holsome lawes and orders that there are, 
" or that hereafter shall be made, and established by lawful] authority, 
" and that I will neither plotl nor practice any evell against the same, 
'•nor consent to any that shall so do, but will tymely discover the 
"same to lawfull authority there established; and that I will, as in 
"duty bound mayntayne the honner of the same and Of the lawful] 
"magestratts thereof, promoting the publike good of it. whilst I shall 
" soe continue an Inhabitant there; and Whensoever I shall give my 
" voate or suffrage touching any matter which concerns this Com- 
'• monwealth being cauld thereunto. will give it as in my conscience 
•• I shall judge may conduce to the besl good of the same, without re- 
spect of persons or favor of any man. So helpe me God in our 
"Lord Jesus Christe." 

While the organization of the Town was thus im- 
proved as respects Inhabitants, it was also advanced 
in regard to its public functionaries. From time to 
time old officers were clothed with new powers, and 
new officers were created. To the ordinary duties of 
Selectmen were added, a supervision of the estates of 
persons deceased, a supervision of the common lands, 
and certain judicial powers in the regulation of wages 
and prices. Their care of estates on the death of 
owners, deserves particular notice, founded as it was 
upon a public anxiety that the rights of kindred, lega- 



ITS MUNICIPAL ORGANIZATION. 103 

tees and creditors, should be fully secured, and "jus- 
tice and equity be done." For this purpose the Se- 
lectmen were empowered and directed to take inven- 
tories, and copies of wills, if made, and report them 
carefully, together with the names of the parties inter- 
ested, to the Public Court for registry and for orders 
of administration — and meanwhile they were to watch 
over and improve with assiduity the property placed 
in their custody. To attend upon them in these mat- 
ters, as well as ' in all such things as they should ap- 
point,' two persons were chosen by the Town. The 
first chosen were Arthur Smith and Thomas Wood. 

In 1639, a Town Recorder or Clerk was for the first 
time appointed. Previous to this period town entries 
were made loosely, more as memoranda than as grave 
records, and by one or more of the Selectmen. Now 
they were to be made regularly, in a book kept for the 
purpose, and by an exclusive and competent officer. 
Every man's house and land, with the bounds and 
quantity of the same, both property of this kind in 
possession and that to be subsequently acquired — and 
all bargains and mortgages of land — were to be re- 
corded, and a transcript of the same, fairly written, 
was to be presented to every General Court to be 
again recorded by the Secretary of the Colony. If 
copies were wanted they were to be made out by the 
Clerk, and to be signed by himself and any two of 
the Selectmen. It was made the duty of the Town 
Clerk besides to keep a record of all marriages and 
births — to enter caveats of creditors against the real 
estate of debtors who were suspected of an intention 
to defraud — to return these caveats to the next Partic- 



104 



HARTFORD 



ular Court, and, in case the creditor failed to prose- 
cute, to enter a vacat upon them. Thus was system 
introduced into transfers of real property. Order and 
publicity gave security to titles, and the fraudulent 
alienation of real estate was in a great degree pre- 
vented. The first clerk in the office now described 
was John Steele — an original commissioner of the col- 
ony, a magistrate, a member for more than twenty 
years of the General Court, subsequently Town Clerk 
of Farmington, and in all respects a useful and re- 
spectable man. 

Nearly at the same time with the establishment of 
a Town Clerk, another new officer was created — a 
Town Crier. Thomas Woodford, 1640, received this 
appointment. Was anything lost — two pence were 
to be paid for the use of his lungs in public meeting. 
Were stray goods placed in the hands of either of 
two men who were appointed, one for the North and 
one for the South side of Little River, to receive 
them, Thomas cried them through the streets, for the 
Settlers were very particular about restoring lost prop- 
erty. It is rather a striking proof of their exactness 
in this respect, that, by one of their town acts, they 
make the finder who fails to place such property in 
the hands of the proper authority guilty of theft. 

Two other new officers were soon added, called 
Fence- Viewers. The stock of cattle, swine, goats and 
horses possessed by the Settlers was quite large. The 
mischief they might do, running at large, is obvious. 
The extreme importance of crops is also obvious. 
Hence a system of fencing and of pounding was at 
once established. Fences shut out the North and the 



ITS MUNICIPAL ORGANIZATION. 105 

South and the Little Meadows from the rest of the 
Town. Fences enclosed cultivated tracts in all parts 
of the Town. Fences shut out the Town from the 
Dutch grounds. These were all to be " good and suf- 
ficient," and were to be judged so by the Fence- View- 
ers. In consideration of their good construction lands 
were frequently given to individuals, as in one in- 
stance thirty acres even. The letters of the names of 
proprietors, in many cases, were-to be set on stakes — 
and children, alas for their joyous pastime, were for- 
bidden to swing upon the public gates. If a Fence- 
Viewer or the Constable caught them ' at it,' wo to 
the little urchins ! Hard, was it not, to disturb such 
their juvenile luxury of motion ? It is the child's by 
prescriptive right ! 

We have heretofore spoken of Surveyors and Chim- 
ney- Viewers as instituted by the Town at its start. 
The powers and duties of these officers increased 
with the progress of time within the period upon 
which we dwell. 

The Surveyors, two of whom were annually chosen, 
were specially charged with the construction and care 
of highways. They were to call out in then; course, 
one day in every year, every person and team fit for 
labor, to make and mend the roads, and to construct 
little causeways or sidewalks in various parts of the 
town. In addition to this they were to survey the 
lines of fences and the common lands, for which pur- 
pose the Town owned and kept a chain, which was let 
out at two pence a day, and was to be mended, if bro- 
ken, by the person using it. It finally, 1644, passed 

into the hands of John Talcott and his heirs for twen- 
14 



106 HARTFORD. 

ty years, upon a special agreement to pay the Town 
for its use. 

The Chimney- Viewers were to examine chimneys 
generally once a month, and exact two shillings and 
sixpence for each failure to cleanse them. They were 
to see that ladders were kept at each house, or trees 
in place of the ladders. No person was to carry any 
fire out of doors, unless safely covered, under a penalty 
of twelvepence. It is obvious that great care in re- 
gard to fires was taken by the Town. Orders upon 
this subject are very frequent. They are the founda- 
tion of our Fire Department. 

Thus, as now described, did Hartford improve its 
municipal organization within its first fifteen years. 
Cemented also, by the Constitution of 1639, in warm- 
er sympathy with her sister towns upon the River, 
and by the Confederation of 1614, in closer alliance 
with all New England towns, she felt the grateful 
force of strong arms about her to sustain and defend 
the institutions she was cherishing, and to urge along, 
with one hope, one life, one destiny, one glory, upon 
the waves, as it were, of a wilderness, the Ark of 
New Kngland liberty. 

Sc.eva. 



artforlh 



ITS JUDICIAL ORGANIZATION— DOWN TO 1650. 
No. 11. 

" 1. That, in the administration of jiistice, 1 am intrusted for God, the 
king, and my country, and therefore, 

"2. That it be done, first, uprightly ; secondly, deliberately; thirdly, reso- 
lutely. 

"3. That I rest not on my own understanding and strength, but implore 
and rest upon the direction and strength of God." 

Sir Matthew Hale, on becoming a Judge. 

Law — " the perfection of reason," or that should be ! 
Abstractly, like Truth in the sublime conception of 
Plato — " the Body of God!" Would not all so think, 
could the ideas, above, of the illustrious Hale be real- 
ized in mortal practice — could Law be made, in human 
administration, to rest ever upon "the direction and 
strength" of the Almighty Fountain of its great tri- 
une elements of justice, and equity, and mercy? Yet 
such is not experience, in this world. We fear it nev- 
er will be till the millenium — nor then if there is one 
woe or even one little quarrelsome impulse left to 
play its discordant part, or one lawyer, doctor or di- 
vine to take its side. Well however is it that the 
Ideal of Law be lifted, as Hale lifts it, high as Heav- 
en ! Well that Law can be thus touched and exalted 



108 HARTFORD. 

with hues other than those of earth — that the splen- 
dors of a loftier world can drape its elemental form, 
and the glory of Eternity embalm its existence ! Else, 
in the weakness of man, it would be without support, 

"Amid a multitude of artless hands, 
Kuin's sure perquisite" — 

or in the sea of man's passion, when the black blast 
blows hard, would become at once a wreck — 

" the tide returning hoarse 
To sweep it from our sight." 

Heavenward, with Hale, did the Settlers of Hart- 
ford look for the deep foundation of their Law — Bi- 
bleward too strictly in adopting the death penalties 
of the Jewish dispensation, as in their ten Capital 
Crimes — yet, though thus theocratic somewhat in 
their views, earthward they looked for the forms of 
Law, and necessarily for its agencies. They had 
their differences and disputes, of course. How were 
these settled? By the General Court — by the Partic- 
ular Court — by a Town Court — by a colonial Magis- 
trate, one or more — by Constables — by the Select- 
men — by Arbitrators, and by Committees. Instru- 
mentalities enough — one would think ! To be sure — 
and the Settlers intended to have enough, for justice 
lay near to their hearts ! 

The General Court, not judicial in its structure, en- 
tertained occasionally, where parties were concerned, 
questions of morals, manners and religion, and con- 
tracts involving the general interests. It enforced or 
prohibited acts, gave counsel, or administered censure, 



ITS JUDICIAL ORGANIZATION. 



109 



somewhat at discretion, but always within what were 
deemed the bounds of prudence and equity, and the 
rules of " God's word." The Particular Court dealt 
chiefly, and always judicially, with debts or trespas- 
ses involving above forty shillings in value, and with 
grave crimes, wrongs and misdemeanors — and Juries, 
the great palladium of liberty, thanks to the Founders 
of our Commonwealth, were coeval with Hartford. 
The Town Court, instituted for the first time in 1639, 
was that in which all controversies, either trespasses 
or debts not exceeding forty shillings, were tried, 
whenever both parties lived in the same town. Hart- 
ford, once every year, elected three, five, or seven of 
its chief inhabitants, one of whom, with a casting 
voice, was chosen Moderator, and these persons, or 
the major part of them, met once every two months — 
summoned parties to answer — administered oaths to 
witnesses — heard and determined, subject to appeal, 
all cases which fell within their jurisdiction, and gave 
judgment and execution against the party offending. 

Magistrates, by whom is here meant the assistants 
or judges of the Particular Court, sworn as they were 
to administer justice according to established laws, 
and "for want thereof according to the rule of the 
word of God," exercised much authority out of as 
well as in term time. To them controversies were 
frequently referred — by them arbitrated. They exer- 
cised a power, in early times, somewhat undefined, 
enforcing rights, preventing wrongs and punishing 
misdemeanors, in the places of their residence as well 
as in other towns, and were armed by statute with 



110 HARTFORD. 

special authority to protect the public peace from 
marauding or trespassing Indians. Read the Oath 
which the Hartford Settlers, in common with those of 
Wethersfield and Windsor, provided for such Magis- 
trates ! Mark the depth of its solemn invocation, the 
grandeur of its aim, the simple yet firm terms in 
which it imposes responsibility, and its lofty recog- 
nition of Almighty Justice ! 

" I, N. W. being chosen a Magistrate within this Jurisdiction for 
" the yeare ensueing, do sweare by the great and dreadful! name of 
" the everliveing God, to promote the publike good and peace of the 
"same, according to the best of my skill, and that I will mayntnyno 
" all the lawfull priviledges thereof according to my understanding, 
" as also to assist in the execution of all such wholesome laws as are 
" made or shall be made by lawfull authority heare established, and 
" will further the execution of Justice for the tyme aforesaid accord- 
" ing to the righteous rule of God's word; so help me God, etc." 

Constables, two of them at first, of town appoint- 
ment, besides their duties as instruments of justice to 
execute the orders of magistrates and courts, were 
specially charged with preserving the peace of our 
Town, with executing its laws when resisted, with 
the enforcement of penalties, with the collection oft- 
en of rates, and with the oversight of watches and 
wards. Read also the solemn Oath which they were 
obliged to take ! 

" I, A. B. of W, doe sweare by the greate and dreadfull name of 
" the everliveing God, that for the yeare ensuing, and untill a new be 
" chosen, I will faythfully execute the office and place of a Constable 
" for and within the said plantation of W, and the lymits thereof, and 
" that I will endevor to presearve the publike peace of the said place, 
" and Commonwealth, and will doe my best endeavor to see all watch- 



ITS JUDICIAL ORGANIZATION, 



111 



"es and wards executed, and to obey and execute all lawful eom- 
" mands or warrants that come from any Magestrat or Magestrats or 
" Courte, so helpe me God, in the Lord Jesus Christ." 

To the conservators of the public peace were added, 
in 1643, Grand Jurors, who were distributed through 
the three towns of the Colony. Of course Hartford 
had its share, and in the power of these officers " to 
make presentment of the breaches of any laws or or- 
ders or any other misdemeanors known of in the ju- 
risdiction," had a new safeguard added to its good or- 
der and security. 

The Selectmen, Arbitrators and Committees, very 
often in the period under consideration, constituted 
tribunals for the settlement of disputes and adjust- 
ment of grievances. To the first, besides difficulties 
which grew out of their ordinary administration of 
town affairs, were specially referred all those arising 
from unreasonable prices in the sale of commodities, 
as well as all oppressions resulting from any " over- 
burdened or disproportioned" labor done by individu- 
als for the Town, and occasioned by " the ignorance 
or corruption" of those to whom the management of 
such work was entrusted. Their decisions, as well as 
those made by Arbitrators and Committees, so far as 
appears, were made in a spirit of kindness, modera- 
tion and justice, and appeals from them were rarely, 
if ever, made in the period upon which we dwell. 

Thus fortified with Courts and Juries, and with nu- 
merous ministers of the law, whose functions, though 
of necessity accommodated to the exigencies of a 
new settlement, and modified by the peculiar spirit of 
those who braved a wilderness, yet rested firmly on 



112 HARTFORD. 

the broad foundations of liberty and truth, Hartford 
enjoyed, during its First Period, an easy, cheap and 
effective administration of justice. The Town there- 
fore, so far as the machinery of law is concerned, was 
at once prepared to prosper. Fundamental rule of 
civil conduct as law is — entering as it does vitally into 
every interest of society — protecting as it does all civ- 
ilized effort for the superior development of life and lib- 
erty and for the acquisition of property — the Settlers 
of Hartford gave it immediately a full and free space 
in their system. That it occupied with them such a 
space, and was withal so simple yet so strong, at a 
period too when in the old country it was not yet half 
emancipated from feudal complexity and restraint — 
when rights and property were still precarious, still 
hung trembling on the lips of power — is matter of 
grateful surprise. That it has endured, in its princi- 
ples as they apply to our Town unchanged to the 
present day, with the names and functions of almost 
all its officers still nearly the same, and its practical 
forms really in no great degree improved, certainly 
not in simplicity, bespeaks a sagacity, practical good 
sense, and love of liberty, on the part of the Settlers 
of our valley, which are worthy of the highest rever- 
ence. Hartford deserved to prosper under the legal 
and municipal system which was first established. It 
was truly patriotic and philosophic. It nobly an- 
swered its end more than two centuries ago. It has 
been fulfilling it ever since — and is now — yet it does 
not exhaust! Be it the fervent wish of all that the 
rush of years may never break its strength ! 

Sceva. 



lartfarlL 



ITS MILITARY HISTORY— DOWN TO 1650. 
No. 12. 

" Tell me, man of military renown, in how many months were they all 
swept off by the thirty savage tribes enumerated within the early limits of 
New England?" Everett. 

" No ! by the marvels of thine hand, 
Thou wilt save thy chosen band." 

Milman. 

Spite of the prudence and kindness with which the 
Settlers of Hartford, and of Connecticut generally, 
treated the Indians, their lives, during the First Pe- 
riod, were passed in almost constant apprehension. 
The Indian would steal, by day, by night, whenever 
he got a chance — whatever he could get. He would 
lurk in dwellings, or break them open, for plunder. 
Cattle and swine he would " spoil or kill with trappes, 
dogges or arrowes." He would threaten, insult, plot, 
waylay. True to his savage instincts, he would do 
mischief and create alarm. Hartford therefore, in 
common with her sister towns, was ever on the de- 
fensive. The Records show her precautions. Watch 
and ward were maintained constantly by night, much 
of the time by day. The Meeting House was always 
15 " 



114 



H ARTFO RD. 



specially guarded. It was amid the tramp of armed 
men that, most of the time, public prayer and praise 
went up to God. The Settlers had often to take their 
weapons of war with their instruments of husbandry 
to the fields they tilled. The Town kept ammunition, 
several barrels, always on hand, and each soldier 
always had enough. Indians were forbidden to han- 
dle " Englishmen's weapons of any sorte," and if 
they possessed any, were to deliver them up or be ac- 
counted enemies. Smiths were not to work for them. 
Trade with them " in any instrument or matter made 
of iron or Steele" was forbidden. They could have 
no powder or shot. They were not permitted to walk 
in the Town by night, and might be shot if they ran 
from the watch. They were forbidden to enter hous- 
es except under certain fixed restrictions as to time 
and numbers, or persons. 

Such, down to 1650, was the every-day condition, 
almost, of Hartford in regard to the Indians, save 
when the Pequot War in 1637, and the supposed 
Narragansett Plot in 1642, multiplied its dangers 
and deepened its alarm. Both of these occasions, of 
course, increased the public precautions — the first es- 
pecially so. 

Inappeasably jealous of the whites, the Pequots, it 
is well known, gave way to the fiercest impulses of 
their barbarous nature. Lurking everywhere almost, 
they would rob, captivate, kill, torture, and fire dwel- 
lings, storehouses and crops. Their murder of Stone, 
and Norton, and Oldham, of numbers of the garrison 
at the mouth of the Connecticut, of more than thirty 
in all of the English — the slow, fearful tortures with 



ITS MILITARY HISTORY. 



115 



which they dispatched Butterfield and Tilly, and the 
mocking, marauding and murdering expedition of one 
hundred of them to Wethersfield, created general con- 
sternation. The Settlers of Hartford could not go 
to work in the fields, not even to church, nor eat, 
nor sleep, nor travel, but with arms in their hands. 
The Pequots, to use the language of Mason, were 
" thorns in their eyes and slashing scourges in their 
sides." No pibroch ' savage shrill,' as of a ' Came- 
ron's gathering,' sounded their approach, either ' in 
the noon of night' or by day. They were silent and 
skulking as adders. Hartford, therefore, doubled and 
trebled its sentinels, ' the drums beating' as they took 
their stations "in every convenient place," and each 
soldier of the Town was " commanded to be in readi- 
ness upon an alarm, upon a penalty of five pound." 
And this state of dread and watchfulness continued 
until the daring, well devised, triumphant expedition 
of Mason exterminated, as if through the vengeance 
of the Almighty, the wily and powerful Sassacus and 
his tribe. 

To this great undertaking Hartford contributed 
more men and supplies than any other town. Of the 
ninety soldiers under Mason, it supplied forty-two — of 
armor fourteen pieces — and of provisions, eighty-four 
bushels of corn, the half of it baked in biscuit and 
half in meal, three firkins of suet and two of butter, 
together " with that at the River's mouth," four bush- 
els of oatmeal, two of peas, two of salt, and " 500 of 
fish." 

Who were these "Soldiers under Mason" from Hart- 
ford — these warriors, the first from our Town in the 



116 



HARTFORD, 



first military expedition of new-born Connecticut ? 
Thanks to the researches of N. Goodwin and J. H. 
Trumbull Esquires in aid of our own, we are able to 
give their names — nearly all of them. Pioneers these 
men were in a fearful risk of life and treasure to save 
a State, and it is gratifying indeed to learn who they 
were. Defenders of liberty against barbaric wiles 
and fierceness — eagle-eyed and eagle-hearted champi- 
ons as they were, in days black with peril, of that 
glorious gem of civilization in whose effulgence their 
posterity of Hartford now bathes and wantons — it is 
good that they should be commemorated. Their's 
the laurel wreath ! Their's reverence ! Their's affec- 
tion ! And it was but just in Connecticut to reward 
them as it did in their day — and as we do those who 
bravely fight our battles now — with grants of land. 
That Soldier's Field, of which we spoke in Article 
Third — and with a hint to the worthy ' Husband' of 
our Town, which has proved most productive — was a 
gift to them, and received its name from the fact.* It 
is by following the distribution of this tract of land, 



^Soldier's Field lay west of our North Meadow Creek, its eastern bound 
nearly coinciding with the line of the Branch Railroad. It extended to the 
Meadow Hill, on which Dr. Bushnell's house now stands, on the west — and 
to Village Street on the south. Its bounds on the north cannot now be ex- 
actly ascertained. It embraced an area of from sixty to eighty acres. Among 
other proofs that it was used as stated in the text are the following deposi- 
tions — quite conclusive in themselves — of Thomas Burr and of Joseph Wads- 
worth, the hero who saved the Charter of Connecticut, made in 1721, in sup- 
port of a petition of Benjamin Munn for a grant of land. 

" These may informe ye Honoured General Courte that my Hon'rd Father 
having been. a first planter of Hartford, I in my youth, who am now 74 years 
old, did often hear my said Father say that those Lots called the Soldier's 
Field were Lots granted to ye Pequoit soldiers only, and that for their good 
service in said War. Joseph Wadsworth." 



ITS MILITARY HISTORY. 117 

as it appears in the old first book of our Town Rec- 
ords, that, chiefly, we secure their names. And here 
they are ! Read them, pray, with that thoughtfulness 
which their memory deserves! 

John Brunson, William Blumfield, Thomas Bull, 
Thomas Bunce, Thomas Barnes, Peter Blackford, Ben- 
jamin Burr, John Clarke, Nicholas Clarke, Capl. John 
Cullick, Sergeant PJiilip Davis, Nicholas Disborough, 
William Hcyden, Thomas Hales, Samuel Hales, John 
Hills, Thomas Hollybnt, (HurlbuL) John Halloway, 
Jonathan Ince, Benjamin Munn, Nicholas Olmsted, 
Richard Olmsted, John Purchas, (Purkas or Perkins,) 
William Pratt, William Phillips, Thomas Root, Thom- 
as Spencer, Thomas Stanton, Rev. Samuel Stone, 
George Steele, Samuel Whitehead, John Warner. To 
these may probably be added the names of Thomas 
Munson, Stephen Hart, Zachary Field, and William 
Cornwell. 

Shortly after the Pequot conquest it became neces- 
sary to maintain it by force of arms, and here Hart- 
ford was again forward. Of the forty men sent un- 
der Lieutenant Seely to accomplish this purpose, our 
Town furnished nineteen, and in supplies twenty- 
eight bushels of corn, forty pounds of butter, half a 
hundred of cheese, and a hundred pounds of beef, be- 
sides fish. Of forty men sent again under Mason, to 
enforce against the Pequots the treaty rights of the 

" I Thomas Burr of Hartford aged 75 years, testify as above written, that I 
heard my Father say as aforesaid, and allso remember said Mini when he 
lived in Hartford and often heard my Father and other Pequot soldiers say 
that said Mun was a soldier in said war with them. 

Thomas Burr." 



118 



HARTFORD. 



Colony, Hartford supplied seventeen, while of the six 
hundred and twenty pounds which the whole war 
cost, this town paid two hundred and fifty-one pounds 
and two shillings. Among the Hartford citizens par- 
ticularly distinguished in the expedition, were Rev. 
Mr. Hooker, Rev. Mr. Stone, Thomas Stanton, and 
Lieutenant Bull. 

Mr. Hooker it was who — when the forces, in a pink, 
in Mr. Pynchon's shallop, in a pinnace and in many 
Indian canoes, started from Hartford — here on the 
banks of our River, amid weeping, startled wives and 
children and kindred, "with that superior piety, spirit 
and majesty which were peculiar to him, like an an- 
cient prophet" addressed the soldiers — and commend- 
ing them warmly to divine protection, bade them " in 
martial power to fight the battles of the Lord and of 
his people." " I still remember," says Major Mason, 
" a speech of Mr. Hooker's on our going aboard — that 
they [the heathen savages] should be bread for us." 
" Going," says Roger Wolcott in his poetical account 
of the Pequot War — 

" Going on board, Oraculous Hooker said, 

Fear not the foe, they shall become your bread!" 

Mr. Stone it was who, attending the soldiers as 
chaplain, kept their courage ever high and holy 
through pious mindfulness — who went to pray with 
them as they sailed, as they marched, in fatigue, in 
pain, and during the perils of a mortal struggle. He 
it was who by " spending most of one Thursday 
night in prayer," seemed to solve their chief and 
weighty embarrassment when they lay at Saybrook 



ITS MILITARY HISTORY. 119 

wholly uncertain as to the course they should take. 
He it was whose supplication that Heaven would af- 
ford the Expedition some sure proof of the fidelity of 
the accompanying Indians, was so fully and singular- 
ly answered by the exploits of Uncas and his party in 
slaughtering hostile Pequots on their way through the 
forests to Saybrook, and at Bass River. Captain Un- 
derbill refers to this fact, and gives some of the lan- 
guage of Mr. Stone's pious entreaty. It is worth 
reading. 

" Lying aboard the vessel with my boat," he says, " the minister, 
" one master Stone, that was sent to instruct the company, was then 

" in prayer solemnly before God, in the midst of the soldiers. The 

" hearts of all in general being much perplexed, fearing the infidelity 
" of these Indians [those accompanying] having not heard what an 
" exploit they had wrought, it pleased God to put into the heart of 
" master Stone this passage in praver, while myself lay under the 
" vessel and heard it, himself not knowing that God had sent him a 
"messenger to tell him his prayer was granted — Lord God, if it 
" be thy blessed will, vouchsafe so much favor to thy poor, distressed 
" servants as to manifest one pledge of thy love, that may confirm us of 
" the fidelity of these Indians towards us, that now pretend friendship 
" and service to us, that our hearts may be encouraged the more in this 
" work of thine. Immediately myself stepping up, told him that God 
" had answered his desire, and that I had brought him this news, that 
" these Indians had brought in five Pequots heads, one prisoner, and 
" wounded one mortally — which did much encourage the hearts of 
" all, and replenish them exceedingly, and gave them all occasion to 
" rejoice and be thankful to God." 

Mr. Stanton it was who, as Indian Interpreter as 
well as soldier, parleyed usefully at all times, and es- 
pecially so at the Casco swamp in Fairfield, when he 
induced two hundred of the old men, women and 
children of the Pequots to surrender themselves. He 



120 HARTFORD. 

subsequently distinguished himself at Pawcatuck by- 
shooting an Indian murderer through both thighs, " at 
such a vast distance" as to be " a wonderment." 

Lieutenant Bull it was who, after Mason's troops 
had given that volley in upon the Pequot Fort which 
Captain Underhill • admired as so ' complete' that 
" the finger of God seemed to have touched both match 
and flint" and when the Fort was in flames, pushed 
in at the imminent risk of his own life, and rescued 
the wounded soldier Arthur Smith from the devour- 
ing element. Brave and efficient soldier that Bull 
was. Providence seems to have taken especial care of 
him — for we learn that a hard piece of cheese which 
he carried in his pocket diverted an Indian arrow 
from his groin and saved his life, the Lieutenant, says 
Major Mason, " having no other defence — which may 
verify the old saying, that a Utile armor would serve if 
a man knew where to place it." 

But a few years after the Pequot War, and the sup- 
posed plot of the Narragansetts to confederate the In- 
dians generally for the destruction of the whites, re- 
newed the alarm in Hartford as it did in other towns. 
The means of defence were therefore again strength- 
ened. Fresh ammunition, new cartridges, new pikes, 
and forty arrow-proof coats were provided. Forty 
men were to remain in the Town for its defence, and 
forty ' compleat in arms' were to attend every public 
religious assembly. The Selectmen and Militia Offi- 
cers were charged by a vote of the Town with the 
duty of directing persons, in case of any alarm, 
where to repair and how to make defence. By vote 
of the Town also the watch were ordered to ring a 



ITS MILITARY HISTORY. 121 

bell every morning before day-break — " to begin at 
the Bridge, and so ring the bell all the way forth and 
back from Master Moody's (Wyllys Hill) to John 
Pratts" [near the present Courant office.] One per- 
son was then to get up in every house, and show a 
light within a quarter of an hour after the ringing of 
the bell, or at least half an hour before day-break, on 
penalty, for any failure, of thirteen shillings and six- 
pence to any informer, and of sixpence to the Town. 

The means and measures of defence now described 
curbed the savage, and kept Hartford, during its First 
Period, safe. The Town was able to run in the main 
a prosperous career. Once only, and this immediate- 
ly after the Pequot War, does it appear to have suf- 
fered at all from want of any of the necessaries of 
life. Then there was a temporary scarcity of corn, 
and for the reason that the Settlers, so many of them, 
were taken, in planting time, from the field of tillage 
to the field of blood. This scarcity, however, was 
soon relieved by active measures on the part of the 
General Court to procure corn from up the River — 
and the scalp of Sassacus, brought hither from the 
Mohawks, gave assurance of the death of Hartford's 
deadliest foe, and left its inhabitants to pursue in 
peace their agricultural labors. 

What a sight must have been to them that Scalp — 
the bronzed, shrivelled, blood-stained integument of 
that savage head, which, with method and with mad- 
ness, had plotted more mischief and wrought out 
more perils for the whites, than the brains of all the 
Indians of New England besides ! 

Yet did Sassacus do aught more, aught less, than 
16 



122 



HARTFORD. 



stick to his tribe ? Hath not his offence ' this extent — 
no more ?' Identified with Pequot power and pride, 
their embodiment — the fond, watchful, jealous expo- 
nent of its sovereignty — " lord of a thousand bow- 
men" — a king — ought he not by every contrivance, at 
all hazards, to have protected his people — and the 
more so as, to his eye at least, the green leaves of his 
tribe's prosperity seemed to wither under the basilisk 
of the white man ? Is patriotism less a virtue in the 
Indian than in the Pale Face? Is his love of life 
and home and liberty less natural, less strong — is it a 
mere .animal, a four-footed love, that may be butch- 
ered, as we do cattle, for meat to satiate Anglo-Sax- 
on appetite ? On the other hand, shall the Anglo- 
Saxon, 1 rusted as he is with the rich, priceless boon 
of law, liberty and religion, pause in his career be- 
cause of barbarian opposition ? May he not carry 
his civilization even at the point of the sword, in an 
extremity, a dark and dangerous one, and for a preser- 
vation thai is vital? We think he may, and so, spite 
of its havoc, spite of its extermination, exonerate the 
Settlers of our valley from all blame in their Pequot 
War. The Indian must fade as doth the leaf — must 
"pass away like the winged breeze!" Doth he not? 
Lo and answer the Setting Sun ! It is his fate, 
gloomy, inexorable, inscrutable — but his fate! 

That Scalp of Sassacus however — what became of 
it ? Mr. Ludlow carried a lock of its long, black, 
wiry hair to Boston, " as a rare sight and a sure dem- 
onstration," to the people of Massachusetts, " of the 
death of their mortal enemy." But what became 
of the rest ? Gone with Sassacus himself, and with 



ITS MILITARY HISTORY 



123 



his tribe, to dust — perhaps, as too black-boding a 
trophy, designedly thrown away — or lost and wasted 
in the oblivious peace which followed its acquisition. 
Would it were here though now, in our Historical 
Hall, to meet the curious eye ! It would be a grate- 
ful terror at this day — darkly, with King Philip's War 
Club, telling of dire days to New England, and me- 
morializing one of the haughtiest and most implaca- 
ble of its savage foes ! What a royal " bugbear for a 
winter's eve !" Sc^va. 






"artfarlL 



ITS LAND POLICY— DOWN TO 1650. 

No. 13. 

"A plot set down for farmers quiet." 

Tusser's Husbandry. 

Soon after its settlement, Hartford increased its ter- 
ritorial domain. By 1639, it had acquired a large ex- 
tent of land on the east side of the Connecticut Riv- 
er, reaching from between Windsor on the north and 
Wethersfield on the south three miles to the east- 
ward. The particulars of this acquisition are no- 
where given, but the fact is conclusively established 
by an order of the Town, dated 1640, which directs 
that "all the upland of the east side of the Great 
River, from Podunk River to Pewterpot River, shall 
be divided to the three-miles end, that is to say, half 
a mile of it measured and staked, and each man's 
proportion to run up the country to the three-miles 
end." This tract embraces nearly that of present 
East Hartford — a fine town in spite of its sands — 
likely child of a likely mother — and which in its mod- 
ern independence, forgets not church or state, nor to 
render its worthy progenitor its annual tribute of the 



126 HARTFORD. 

earliest peas, the best melons, the choicest pop-corn, 
and best nectar-beer of the region round about. 

It will be remembered, by those who have read our 
previous Articles, that lands were first distributed by 
the Settlers on condition that they should be im- 
proved, and house-lots on condition that dwellings 
should be erected. This policy, founded in a desire 
to stimulate industry, to fix inhabitants to the soil, 
and in a measure to insure their good conduct, was 
pursued quite steadily during the period under consid- 
eration. Sometimes we find it relaxed in favor of 
persons rendering some essential service to the pub- 
lic — sometimes in case of those who gave plausible 
reasons for its violation, and who expiated their de- 
fault by the payment of small fines — but generally 
lands and lots were forfeited for any breaches of the 
fundamental orders. The original restraint upon their 
free alienation was, 1640, modified so as to permit all 
who had been inhabitants for four years to sell as 
they pleased — and this continued till, 1651, the Gen- 
eral Court reinstated the old system, by which the 
consent of the Town was required to sales, and the 
Town itself to be preferred as a purchaser. 

In other respects the Land System of Hartford was 
wise and liberal. It constantly, as occasions arose 
either by the accession of new Settlers, or from the 
increased wants of the old, parcelled out its unappro- 
priated lands to suit the demand. It provided, at 
first through committees annually appointed by the 
Town, and subsequently through the Selectmen, for 
the careful superintendence of lands which' remained 
under the common charge— securing them from dam- 



ITS LAND POLICY. 127 

age by swine or'cattle — preserving their timber by the 
restraint of licenses to cut and carry away — fencing 
them where required — and occasionally converting 
them to agricultural use, especially where necessity, 
"in the beginnings wherein" the Settlers were, con- 
strained it. Sometimes it made donations of portions 
of them, in consideration of ditching, clearing, or 
some other important improvement, and sometimes 
bestowed them in reward of public service, or as a 
boon to poor and honest industry. The course of the 
Settlers in this respect was just and enlightened. Its 
large fund of common land was made to serve the 
common good. The knowledge and consent of all 
inhabitants of the Town were essential to its distri-. 
bution. All mistakes in its allotment were rectified 
by committees appointed for the purpose. Each man 
had his share on easy terms, and it was his own fault 
if he did not work his agricultural mine to his own 
advantage. 

As for appropriated lands, these were all to be re- 
corded, as we have already had occasion to state, and 
to be bounded, every particular parcel, with mere- 
stones, and so were to be recorded bargains and mort- 
gages of all real estate — a simple, cheap and effective 
policy, which assured titles, prevented frauds, and 
confirmed the rights«of heirs, legatees, creditors, and 
of all parties in interest. The Settlers — thanks to 
their good sense and foresight — left the feudal law, 
save a few of its harmless forms and phrases, they 
left it, with its tedious, cqstly and oppressive intrica- 
cies, almost wholly behind them. More thoughtful 



128 HARTFORD. 

than the Colonists of New York, Virginia, the Caro- 
linas and Georgia, whose jurisprudence long retained 
many marked traits of feudalism — not yet in all of 
them entirely obliterated — they at once, with their sis- 
ter towns both in Connecticut, Massachusetts and 
Rhode Island, abrogated in practice the cumbrous 
legal machinery of the Old World, and annihila- 
ted almost every vestige of its law of tenures. No 
knight service with them as a condition of holding 
lands ! None of the oppressive exactions of relief, 
wardship and marriage ! No right of primogeniture ! 
No preference of males in the title by descent ! No 
practice of subinfeudation ! No endless and involved 
restraints on alienation ! No locking up of real es- 
tate within the jaws of mortmain and entail to bury 
it from the natural wants of commerce, and the just 
control of proprietors ! But ownership upon the de- 
fined, certain, predial and pacific services of free and 
common socage — ownership subject only to that easy 
fealty, and those equitable rents and services, which 
do but compensate for its protection, and support the 
just authority of the Public — ownership that is sub- 
servient to the purposes of business, that is in the 
main alienable at the will of the owner, that may 
be taken and sold for debt, that passes to children 
equally by inheritance — vital ownership in fee simple, 
by allodial title, by the grasp of an absolute and di- 
rect property and dominion — such was the simple, 
complete, inspiring interest which a Hartford Settler 
had in his lands. Save in the idea that he held under 
an ultimate superior authority, with certain corres- 
ponding obligations on his own part, his possession 



ITS LAND POLICY. 129 

was free as air. And this superior authority was, cu- 
riously enough, during the first thirty years of Hart- 
ford, not even King Charles the First, nor the Protect- 
ors Cromwell — for the oath of allegiance to the incar- 
nation of old England's sovereignty never passed the 
lips of a Hartford Settler till after the Charter of 
1662 was granted — but the authority in question was 
the People, that new republican supremacy which a 
noble patriotism substituted, amid the wild woods of 
a new continent, for monarchy, tyranny and folly 
across the seas — that grand power on which true lib- 
erty ever leans in securest repose, which it should de- 
voutly seek ever to cherish, and in a sweet, solemn 
sense of loyalty love ever to revere. Good for old 
Hartford! Sceva. 

17 



fjartforh 



ITS SUMPTUARY POLICY— DOWN TO 1650. 

No. 14. 

"And they fixed the prices thereof." Anon. 

" The apparel oft denotes the man." Hamht. 

" Nay oft, in dreams, invention we bestow 
To change a flounce, or add a furbelow." 

Pope,. 

In the age upon which we dwell, Sumptuary Laws, 
restraining by checks more or less severe extrava- 
gance in dress, furniture, food and private expenditure 
generally, and laws regulating the prices of commod- 
ities and of labor, existed in nearly every civilized 
government, and were deemed essential parts of a 
true political economy. The evils of luxury, the ef- 
feminacies and wastefulness supposed to be engen- 
dered by wealth, the fundamental importance of fru- 
gality to a State, the impositions often involved in 
large prices, these circumstances, together with the 
notion derived from the classical ages, that simple 
habits of living were essential to the preservation of 
true heroism and patriotism, to the growth of all the 
hardy virtues of a primitive golden age, made it the 



132 HARTFORD. 

prominent doctrine of the day, that freedom in proper- 
ty and labor were inconsistent with a sound and en- 
lightened civil liberty. Spirits of Horace, Juvenal 
and Sallust, Shade of the Twelve Tables, what a 
legacy in this respect did ye leave the world ! It was 
the doctrine not alone of courts and monarchies, but 
of democracies — not alone of England, and France, 
and Sweden, and of other European governments, 
but also of every American Colony. It has taken 
centuries to overthrow it — centuries to establish the 
freedom of industry, and that just and liberal doctrine 
which, in the language of Adam Smith, makes it " an 
act of the highest impertinence and presumption for 
kings and rulers to pretend to watch over the econo- 
my and expenditure of private persons." It was not 
until late as 1824, that in England the last traces of 
interference with the rights of operative industry were 
swept from the British Statute Books. Late as 1777, 
a Committee of our own American Congress recom- 
mended the several States to regulate by law the 
price of labor, manufactures, and internal produce, 
and the charges of innholders. Following up this 
suggestion, late as 1778, acts of the Legislatures 
of New York, Connecticut, and probably of other 
States, limited the price of labor and its products, 
and tavern charges, and prices in inns were still, late 
as 1836, fixed by law in New Jersey and Alabama. 

Our Readers, therefore, will not be surprised to learn 
that the Hartford Settlers, sharing the views of the 
day, dealt in sumptuary legislation. "Ordered," 1641, 
says the General Court, in which Hartford then had 



ITS SUMPTUARY POLICY. 133 

the chief influence, in view of " excess in apparel, by 
divers persons of several ranks, ordered that the Con- 
stables of every Town within these Liberties, shall 
observe and take notice of any particular person or 
persons within their several limits, and all such as 
they judge to exceed their condition therein [to wit, in 
apparel] they shall present and warn to appear at the 
Particular Court — and the said Court hath power to 
censure any disorder in the particulars before men- 
tioned." 

Strange — is it not ? To walk about with your 
dress each moment subject to the espionage of a 
Constable — in dread each minute of being summoned, 
to receive a grave, frowning rebuke, in a public Court 
Room, from the lips of the highest judges of the 
land — think of it! Yet the principle of this order is 
the same with that of many which have issued from 
kings of England against short doublets and long 
coats — the same with that of Henry Fourth's procla- 
mation, that no man should wear shoes above six 
inches broad at the toes because " pride had g-ot so 
much into the foot." It is the same with that of 
Queen Bess's regulation of the apparel of appren- 
tices, and of the dress, and hair, and beards of her 
lawyers — the same with that of the admonition, in 
James the First's time, to the students of Oxford, 
against the ' fearful enormities' of peccadilloes, vast 
bands, huge ruffs, shoe-roses, and tufts, locks and 
tops of hair, as " unbeseeming their modesty and car- 
riage." It is the same with that of thousands of 
laws, from the time when the old Locrian legislator 
Zaleucus ordained that no woman should go attended 



134 



HARTFORD, 



with more than one maid in the street, 'unless she 
ivas drunk,'' down to the present day. 

Yet what upon earth had the Settlers of Hartford, 
a plain people — in garments, as one supposes, usually 
of serge, and kersey, and cotton and hemp, of a dark 
and sober hue — with scarcely more of means than 
they plucked day by day, with hard toil, from the 
jaws of a wilderness — what had they to do with any 
" excess in apparelling ?" Not to their men certainly 
belonged 



" The spangled garters worth a copyhold, 

Nor hose and doublet which a lordship costj 

Nor a gaudy cloak three manors worth almost, 

Nor a beaver band and feather for the head 

Prised at the church's tithe — the poor man's bread." 

Nor to their women seemingly could it befall to be 
fanned ' with the soft wind of whispering silks,' to 
rustle in spangles, furbelows and flounces, or to move 
in bulky petticoats of tafiety surmounted with velvet 
kixtles, or in dresses furred with ermine, or with bugle- 
embroidered capes of lace. Fugitives, and Puritan 
fugitives too, all of them, from a land of pomp and 
vanities — who could not bear the low-crowned Flem- 
ish beaver, or Naples hat, and the Savoy chain or Mi- 
lan sword, or ruff and cuff of Flanders, or the " cloak 
of Geneva with Brabant buttons set" — to whom far- 
dingales, and scented lovelocks, and patches of court 
plaster bewitchingly laid on, and perfumed rings 
and necklaces, and lotions and unguents, and gloves 
' breathing an air as sweet as damask roses,' were an 
abomination — why should such a people find it so 
soon necessary among themselves, in their new and 



ITS SUMPTUARY POLICY. 135 

straitened circumstances, to lay the strong hand of 
the law on dress ? Were Silk stockings, or birds-eye 
hoods, too much in vogue ? Were shoes too enor- 
mously high-heeled? Had any rich, tenuous lawns 
or muslins stolen into the settlement to furnish caps, 
' with silver curlings, white as snow ?' Did ointment 
and perfume begin 'to rejoice the heart?' Did the 
ladies, for dressing too low, begin to require the non- 
conformist's 'just and seasonable reprehension ?' Or 
were the falling collars of the men too nicely pointed 
with lace, their cuffs too elaborate, their hose too gay- 
colored, their shoe-roses too trim with ribbons ? Did 
their 

" High-crowned hats, with a widish brim, 
Tied all around with a wrinkled string," 

become too low, or steal a gracefully drooping feather 
or so from the plume of the Cavalier ? 

Some, probably several of the causes now suggest- 
ed, combined to draw down upon the lovers of dress, 
in the first years of Hartford, the restraining law to 
which we have referred. A strange law to us — yet 
excusably so ! But what were its effects ? Here his- 
tory is silent. We'll venture the opinion, however, 
that it never was enforced with much strictness. In 
spite of any denunciations from the Courts, the pul- 
pit, or the grave social circle, spite of the fact that 
proverbially no Cromwellite could bear silks and sat- 
ins, and spite of the Constables, we have no doubt 
that all who wanted to dress handsomely did so to 
the extent of their means — not eschewing ornaments, 
when they could get them, nor deeming even a little 



136 HARTFORD. 

finery irreligious — and feeling all the better and the 
merrier the while, in their 'loves and their friendships, 
for the reason that they could note and talk a little 
about some innocent embellishment of attire, or some 
pretty trinket, or of even the flowing ringlets, and 
slashed doublets, and white-laced waistcoats, and 
crimson short-petticoats, and hair a la negligence, of 
the cavaliers and dames of the Court across the At- 
lantic. The love of dress is innate, and fashion in 
this respect, always grasping at display, is more om- 
nipotent than law. How much of elegance and rich- 
ness, of ruffling and costly embroidery, do we not see 
in the costumes which have come down to us from 
the early days of Connecticut! 

But now as regards labor. About this, Hartford 
very early passed an act regulating its price. The 
wages of the ordinary day-laborer varied, according 
to the season and his ability, from eighteen pence to 
two shillings and sixpence a day. He was to work 
eleven hours in the summer and nine in the winter. 
The labor of cattle varied, according to their good- 
ness and the season, from fourteen to eighteen pence 
the pair a day, and for the use of a cart from three 
pence to sixpence a day was to be paid. 'Also,' 
says a vote of the town — 

" No man shall take above 4s. 6p. for sawing of boards, and 5s. 6p. 
"for slitwork, the timber being squared and laid at the pit; nor 
" above 8p. a C. for riving six foot poles or clapboard, and 6p. a C. 
" for three foot : nor above 7s. for boards, and 2s. 6p. for three foot 
"clapboards: and whosoever gives or takes more, directly or indi- 
" rectly shall forfeit for every time 5s." 



ITS SUMPTUARY POLICY. 137 

It was also ordered that the Townsmen should set- 
tle, through arbitration, any difficulties, involving op- 
pression, which might arise in any labor contracts of 
importance, and that they should fine, according to 
the offence, every person who sold any commodity, 
and took " unreasonable fair or work in men's necessi- 
ty." To the Town regulations now stated, and bear- 
ing of course directly on the Town, were added regu- 
lations of the same character by the General Court. 
The last were from time to time repealed, in the hope 
that in the matters they concerned " men would have 
been a law unto themselves" — a glimmer here of true 
political economy — but were reinstated when ' little 
reformation' was found ' therein,' and wages were in 
excess. By these regulations, carpenters, plowwrits, 
wheelwrights, masons, joiners, smiths, coopers and 
mowers, were to receive according to the season, 
working eleven hours in the summer and nine in the 
winter, from eighteen to twenty pence per day — and 
all other artificers, and handicraftsmen and chief la- 
borers, from fourteen to eighteen pence a day, and in 
proportion for parts of a day. Sawyers were to re- 
ceive four shillings and sixpence for slit-work or three 
inch plank — three shillings and sixpence for boards by 
the hundred — and boards were not to be sold for more 
than five shillings and sixpence the hundred. From 
four shillings to four and sixpence a day were to be 
charged for " four of the better sort of oxen or horses 
with their tackling," more being allowed for breaking 
up upland ground than any other, and the penalty for 
disobedience of any of the above orders was, the Cen- 
18 



138 



HARTFORD. 



sure of the Court — a penalty too grave and impres- 
sive in former times to be easily disregarded. 

Thus in the early days of Hartford was labor regu- 
lated, and to some extent the prices of commodities. 
Unsound as we know this policy to be, it is yet wor- 
thy of remark that the Hartford Settlers ameliorated 
it much, in comparison with their cotemporaries in 
England. With the latter a precise and stringent 
Statute for Laborers, passed early as 1349, and re- 
peatedly confirmed by successive Parliaments, had for 
more than three centuries borne oppressively upon all 
branches of industry. With the former a few laws, 
not severe in their character, not formidable in their 
penalties, and intermitted in their execution, bore 
only upon a part of labor. With the latter the Proc- 
lamations of Justices every Easter and Michaelmas, 
backed by the whole civil authority of the realm, left 
a tyrannous discretion over labor in the hands of a 
few. With the former such regulation of labor as 
did exist, emanated from the people, and left no dis- 
cretion in fickle hands. With the latter not only the 
prices of all commodities were generally fixed, but 
even the food and the clothing of laborers, what they 
should eat and wherewithal they should be clad, were 
determined by law. With the former a low price 
was established for but a few commodities, and there 
never was a particle of interference with food, or with 
raiment, save to check its " excess" — had there been, 
the republican stomach of the Town would at once, 
we believe, have burst out in rebellion. With the lat- 
ter it was a frequent provision that if any unem- 
ployed person refused to work at the established rates, 



ITS SUMPTUARY POLICY, 



139 



he might be imprisoned. "With the former no such 
despotic rule ever found a place. The Hartford Set- 
tlers then, it is apparent, were, in respect to the policy 
now under consideration, far in advance of their 
mother country. Source of a just pride is this ! But 
at the same time they were much behind the views of 
the present day. They had not yet, though they had 
some perceptions of it, not yet learned the fundamen- 
tal rule that no legislation can advantageously fix 
either the minimum or the maximum of wages — that 
no employer can give more, and no workman take 
less, than he can afford without impoverishment — that 
the interests of each, without any combinations by 
either to raise or depress prices, should be left to fur- 
nish the standard of emolument — that, in short, the 
price of Labor, as well as of commodities generally, 
is to be regulated by the natural, wise Law of Supply 
and Demand. Sc.eva. 



f atff0rlL 



ITS AGRICULTURE— DOWN TO 1650. 

No. 15. 

" Good farme and well stored, good housing and drie, 
Good come and good dairy, good market and rie, 
Good shepherd, good tillman, good Jacke and good Gill, 
Hakes husband and huswife their coffers to fill." 

Tusser's Husbandry. 

Agriculture, at the time when Hartford was set- 
tled, had made considerable progress in England. 
For about a century it had been studied as a science. 
Authors like Fitzherbert, Tusser, Sir Hugh Piatt, and 
Sir Richard Weston, had contributed quite profound- 
ly to its elucidation. Its principal grains, grasses, 
and roots, except clover, the potatoe and the tur- 
nip, were known and cultivated. Agricultural imple- 
ments, though vastly improved since, were quite vari- 
ous. The plow, the hoe, the spade, the shovel, the 
fork, the wain, the wheelbarrow, the hack for break- 
ing clods, the clotting beetle, the weeding nippers, the 
scythe, the vine and pruning knife, the hammer with 
the file and chisel, and other grafting instruments, 
were all in use. The domestic animals were known 
and carefully bred. Tillage was practised with much 
skill. Horticulture had become an art. The system 



142 HARTFORD. 

of enclosures, drainage and manures was applied, and 
many important principles of agricultural chemistry 
were well understood. 

The Hartford Settlers brought with them, of course, 
the agricultural knowledge of the Old Country — its 
plants, its fruit trees, its animals, its implements, its 
experience. They had however at first but few plows, 
and ' fell' consequently to tearing up the bushy lands, 
in Indian style, with their hands and with their hoes. 
But they had carts and teams both of oxen and of 
horses, the former being used by the pair, or pairs, 
but sometimes three only. To the plants which they 
brought from England they added the cultivation of 
many peculiar to the New World, particularly Indian 
Corn, that noble vegetable, which, according to abo- 
riginal tradition, the sacred blackbird first brought in- 
to New England.* How many mouths has it fed — 
how many doth it continue to feed — how many car- 
casses fattened, both of man and beast, and its an- 
nual heap of five hundred millions of bushels in our 
country now how colossal ! ' Mercies' indeed were 
its meal pottage unparched, and its milk or butter 
samp to the Hartford Settlers, " mercies beyond the 
natives plain water, and dishes exceedingly whole- 
some to English bodies !" And they enjoyed them, 
most of the time, to the extent of their wants, for the 
natural increase of corn is great — " the Lord did miti- 



* Hear Benjamin Tomson, the first native poet of America, describe it, as 
it soothed Indian appetite ! 

* * * * " The dainty Indian maize 
Was eat with clamp shells out of wooden trayes, 
Under thatch'd hutts without the cry of rent, 
And the best sawce to every dish, content." 



ITS AGRICULTURE. 143 

gate their labors in planting it by reason of the Indi- 
an's frequent fireing of the fields" — and with the ex- 
ception only of two or three years, their upland and 
valleys, then as now, laughed abundantly with the 
rich, ripe crop. 

Besides this vegetable the Settlers had wheat, which 
though with them as with us subject to the blast, was 
yet in such abundance that " good white and wheaten 
bread was no rarity, but every ordinary man had his 
choice of it, if gay clothing and a liquorish tooth 
after sack, sugar and plums, did not lick it away too 
fast." They had also barley, rye, oats and pease. 
Of beans, the contribution, according to the Indians, 
of the crow to agriculture, they had a great variety, 
white, black, red, yellow, blue and spotted. They 
had tobacco, that sovereign plant, whose virtues, in 
the received opinion of the day, were that it helped 
digestion, the gout and toothache, prevented infection 
by scents, " heated the cold, cooled them that sweat, 
fed the hungry, spent spirits restored, purged the 
stomach, and besides killed nits and lice." Cured 
with molasses and rum it was pronounced " very pal- 
atable." To encourage its growth, a law for some- 
time forbade the use of any for " drink," that is for 
smoking, except what was grown within the liberties 
of Connecticut, under a penalty of five shillings. 
And yet, " forasmuch as it was observed that many 
abuses were committed by the frequent taking" of it, 
it was ordered by the General Court, 1647, that no 
person under the age of twenty years, nor any other 
that had not already accustomed himself to the use 
thereof, should take anv tobacco without license from 



144 



HART FO RD. 



the Court, and a certificate of its usefulness in the 
particular case, under the hand of some one approved 
for knowledge and skill in physic — and then he was 
not to take it " publiquely in the street," nor in the 
fields, or woods, unless on a journey of at least ten 
miles, or unless at that " ordinary tyme of repast corn- 
only called dynner." Nor was he to take it " above 
once in the day at most, and then not in company 
with any other" — nor could any one using tobacco 
take it in the society of more than one who also used 
it. Lovers of the ' weed ' were thus limited by law to 
squads of two, and there was a penalty of sixpence 
for each offence against the above orders, " in any of 
the particulars thereof, to be paid without gainsaying, 
upon conviction by the testimony of one witness 
before any Magistrate," and the Constables were 
required to make presentment of all transgressors. 
Soul of Pocahontas, Shade of John Nicot, Ghost of 
Ralph Lane, Spirit of Sir Walter Raleigh, Pocket of 
Virginia, Custom Houses of Great Britain and the 
world, what a law! Brain of Scawa, that under the 
gentle, genial soothings of the 'weed' inditeth this 
and all thine Articles on the olden time of Hartford, 
how would thy thought-engendering pulses cease 
to beat, if each quid of the Nicotiana Tabacum was 
a grave transgression of law, to be appalled by the 
Constable, and to cost thee a " sixpence!" 

The Settlers also had hemp and flax. With the for- 
mer plant they took particular pains. Long known to 
the Aborigines, and by them used for making lines 
and nets, it became essential to the Settlers not only 
for the same purposes, but also for clothing and the 



ITS AGRICULTURE. 145 

sails and cordage of their vessels. Early as 1640, it 
and its sister flax, received the particular attention of 
the General Court, and a law was passed compelling 
their cultivation. Every family, that year, was to 
plant one spoonful of English hempseed, in some 
fruitful soil, " at least a foot distant betwixt every 
seed, and the same so planted to preserve and keep in 
a husbandly manner for supply of seed for another 
year." The second year every family keeping a team 
was to sow at least one rood of hemp or flax, and 
every person keeping any cattle was to sow twenty 
perches, and every family, though keeping no cattle, 
was to sow ten perches, and to provide at least half a 
pound of hemp or flax, or in default thereof to under- 
go the censure of the Court. And again, in 1641, 
there being some difficulty in procuring hemp seed, it 
was ordered that such persons as had more than the 
quantity of a spoonful, and who refused to sell to 
those who were unprovided, should plant the more 
themselves. Thus were two plants, two of the high- 
est importance to the clothing arts, early introduced 
into Hartford. The deep and friable loams of our 
meadow lands were very favorable to their growth, 
and their culture and management were probably as 
well understood here as at that time in England. 
The rippling of the flax, the management of its cap- 
sules, the separation of the seed, and the separation 
of the fibre from the bark, and the watering, bleach- 
ing and grassing of hemp, were all processes with 
which the Settlers were familiar, and they were soon 
able in these ways, and with good crops, to supply 
themselves, to quite a large extent, with cloth, and 
19 



146 HARTFORD. 

nets, and sails and cordage. Fortunate were they in 
coming to lands so fruitful, which opened so cheerful- 
ly to receive seeds the most useful, and to convert 
them by the kind and magic benevolence of nature 
into the necessaries of life ! 

Garden vegetables the Settlers had in good variety, 
among others particularly the vine-apple or squash, of 
several colors, which made ' a sweet, light, wholesome 
refreshing' — and radishes ' big as a man's arm' — and 
pumpkins, which, says Johnson in his "Wonder- Work- 
ing Providence, " let no man make a jest at, for with 
this fruit the Lord was pleased to feed his people to 
their good content, till Corn and Cattell were in- 
creased." Of pear and apple trees, particularly of 
the last, they had a plenty. Orchards ' prospered 
abundantly.' One Apple Tree, from which some of 
their own hands plucked fruit, still survives, gnarled 
and hoary with age, to tell of two hundred and four- 
teen years ago ! It is upon the premises known as 
the Charter Oak Place, and its portrait, taken at our 
request by George Flagg Esq., of New York, may be 
seen on Smith's recent map of the City. Though 
tottering it yet has strength — trembling at once with 
energy and age. New but vigorous branches, amid a 
few withered hands that still stretch out, continue to 
shoot from its dilapidated trunk, as if it hated yet to 
yield its life, and clung, monument and memorializer 
of the sturdy hands that planted it, to the soil in 
which its roots were first sunk. It still yields its an- 
nual tribute of a few apples, the English Pearmain. 
Its proprietor very kindly gives us two or three each 
year. We eat them with intense satisfaction ! They 



ITS AGRICULTURE. 147 

feed the nerves and glands of our appetite as amply, 
and thrillingly, as if they came straight down from 
Eve's own witch of an apple tree in the garden of 
Eden ! Who, on looking at the venerable relic which 
yields them, would not exclaim with the writer, in 
fond respect — 

" Then with eternal greenness on thy form, 

Stand thou forever there to battle with the storm!" 

Besides garden vegetables the Settlers had many 
garden fruits — as the cherry, plum and quince, the 
water melon, a fruit proper to the country, grapes, of 
which they made good wine, and strawberries, a fruit 
of itself so excellent that " one of the chiefest doctors 
of England," says Roger Williams, "was wont to 
say that God could have made, but never did make a 
better berry." Oh for a piece, just now, of that 
strawberry-bread, with which, after the fruit was 
pounded in a mortar, and mixed with meal and 
cream, and baked, the Hartford Settlers used to re- 
gale themselves ! Flanked with some of that mar- 
malade, and those preserved damsons, and those 
pumpkin tarts, which were ' to be found in every 
house,' where could one get now-a-days a more 
tempting confection ? And then with a Puritan 
father to say grace, and a Puritan mother with her 
'bairns' to flavor the meal, and among them a Puri- 
tan Jenny, ' woman grown,' 

"In youthfu' bloom, love sparkling in her e'e," 

to help you eat it, and keep your heart all the while 
in harmonious titillation with your tongue ! What a 



148 



HARTFORD, 



confection, a soft electuary of moral as well as physi- 
cal sweetness this would be ! Wc think we could en- 
dure it — possibly — that is to say we could were we 
not a married man ! But now to us, 

"Upon his wing of golden light, 

Cupid has passed with an eaglet's flight, 

And, flitting on, doth semi to say, 
Fare thee well, thou'st had thy day!" 

But to return. We have said nothing as yet about 
the domestic animals of the Settlers, and Ihese, as is 
familiar, play a very important part in agriculture. 
They did in. the early agriculture of our town. Be- 
sides oxen the Settlers had cows, of course — most of 
the time enough — and they look much pains to im- 
prove the breed of their cattle, for we find committees 
often appointed, and by the Town, 'to view Bull- 
calves, and have them kept for Bulls.' and of these 
only 'such as had liberty from the townsmen,' were 
'to go into the herds.' All cattle were carefully ear- 
marked with all manlier of crops and slits, and thus 
bearing the distinguishing marks of proprietorship, 
they fed, doubtless with great satisfaction, on the vir- 
gin grass of our valley, and lowed their complaints 
and their affections both in numbers and in blood 
highly respectable for the times. They were sur- 
rounded on all sides by families of goats — "he was 
accounted nobody that had not a trip or flock of 
these" — and by families of sheep, of which there was 
'a good store' — and as for hogs, judging from the fre- 
quent mention made of these in town legislation, one 
would almost think their name was Legion. These 



ITS AGRICULTURE. 149 

unruly and perverse yet indispensable creatures, that 
have no sense certainly of cleanliness, and not much 
sense of any other kind, that are continually running 
their noses into every body's business, and are prover- 
bially headstrong, were seldom allowed the privilege 
of wandering unless with rings in their snouts, and a 
malefactor's yoke upon their necks. Such of them 
as were " violent in breaking down fences, and were 
noted to kill poultry," were not by law to be kept at 
all — they were consigned, without chance of redemp- 
tion, to the knife. No laws, in our early Town rec- 
ords, arc of more frequent occurrence than those re- 
lating to the resia-aintj by pounds and fences, of most 
of the domestic animals. Cattle were not to run at 
large — goats were not to be put in the ' Common,' or 
in the streets, without a keeper, and keepers, or herds- 
men, were frequently appointed for cattle and flocks. 
Two pence were exacted from the owner of each in- 
carcerated animal, and pound breach was punished 
by a fine of ten shillings. 

As for horses, they were common, but we do not 
hear of any among them professing Arabian, Andalu- 
sian or Flemish descent. There was among them no 
blood of the Barb — no Flying Childers, or Eclipse, 
but most were of the common English draught horse 
breed, with perhaps here and there a road horse, a 
galloway, or a pony. Josselyn does not speak well of 
the New England horses generally about this period. 
He says they were numerous, with here and there a 
good one, but that their owners, except ' Magistrates, 
Great Masters and Troopers,' seldom provided fodder 
for them in the winter, by reason of which they were 



150 HARTFORD. 

"brought very low in flesh till the spring, and so 
crest-fallen that their crests would never rise again !" 
We believe this, so far as Hartford is concerned, to 
be a slander, and that the Settlers, though they were 
not all ' big bugs,' took just as good care of their 
horses as they did of themselves. 

As for poultry, this abounded. Josselyn speaks of 
one variety in New England which had ' commonly 
three broods in a year.' It was customary then 
as now, to bring any choice breeds from England, 
though we do not find that the modern ' hen fever' 
ever prevailed. The Settlers probably never heard of 
a Dorking, Poland, Chittagong or Madagascar fowl. 
The breed they had was, we think, pretty much 
the Creole, resulting from the ordinary intermixture 
among the fowls, without regard to any laws of taste, 
of their ordinary door-yard friendships. Josselyn, to 
be sure, speaks of one variety which was somewhat 
peculiar, a cock and a hen " that had horns like spurs 
growing out of each side of their combs," which ' a 
good woman' brought aboard with her in 1637, for a 
voyage to New England, but ' she spoiled the breed,' 
he says, by " killing of them at sea to feed upon, for 
she loved a fresh bit" — so that Hartford, it will be 
seen, never got the advantage of this stock — and all 
owing, like sin in the world, to the perverse appetite 
of angel woman ! To the creatures now mentioned 
add cats, which were ' common here as in England' — 
and dogs, which were ' gallant both for fowl and for 
wild beast' — and the buds and the squirrels, and the 
rabbits, and the fawn, that the children tamed, and it 
will be apparent that so far as the domestic animals 



ITS AGRICULTURE. 151 

are concerned, the Settlers of Hartford were well pro- 
vided. 

We leave them then in their agriculture, and with 
then quadrupeds and bipeds, to their enjoyments. It 
is night, and they have laid aside their implements of 
husbandry, and shut their stable doors, and locked up 
their houses, and have ceased in their sleep to think 
of farming or stock, of Church or State, or the Indi- 
an. Their chickens have long gone to roost, and so 
must we! Scjeva. 



gartforlL 



ITS TRADES AND COMMERCE— DOWN TO 1650. 

No. 16. 

"And thy sons 

From their sweet sleep at early dawn dost call, 

Mindless of wintry blast, or sultry suns, 

Some goodly task proportioning to all." 

Mrs. Sigourney. 



'Market, and fair, and warehouse help the scene." 



"I behold the ships 
Gliding from cape to cape, from isle to isle, 
Or stemming towards far lands, or hastening home 
From the old world." 



Anon. 



Bryant. 



What do you expect, Reader, in this Article ? 
Something, or we shall ' miss fire,' and this we should 
hate to do. We like a report, sound it loud or not, 
both for self's sake and for your own. But we can 
not promise you a treat of positive richness to-day, 
for our material is comparatively sparse. Still it is 
good so far as it goes, because it is history, and that 
of — Hartford. Try and think so ! 

What would be your first-blush impression about 

trades in our Town during the Period upon which we 

dwell? Were they many or few — skilfully executed 

or not — and what ? We can tell you but little as to 

20 



154 



HARTFORD. 



their practical management, but that they existed in 
good variety is certain. We find mention often 
made of carpenters, wheelwrights, plow-writs, ma- 
sons, joiners, hatters, smiths, butchers, coopers, tan- 
ners and curriers, and weavers. Other ' artificers and 
handicraftsmen,' including doubtless shoemakers, tail- 
ors, and ropers, are alluded to in the Records, but are 
not particularly described. The business of a sawyer 
was a common one, and was performed by the hand, 
and by means of two laborers, one of whom stood at 
one end of the saw in a pit dug in the ground, and 
the other above on a frame upon which the timber to 
be sawed was placed. The business of a miller was 
of course pursued, but did not engross many hands. 
The first mill, Mr. Allyn's, was at the foot of present 
West Pearl street — the second a few rods below the 
present site of Mr. Imlay's flouring mill, near the resi- 
dence of J. Catlin, Esq., and the third upon this last 
mentioned site Mills were a frequent subject of 
town legislation in early times. Tanning also re- 
ceived much attention, and at the hands too of the 
General Court. It is even called a • mystery' in their 
Records, and they provided by law for the " prudent 
preserving and seasonable bringing forth to dressing" 
of the skins and pelts particularly of cows and gouts, 
and at one time, 1G45, for the supply of leather, or- 
dered that no calves should be killed within the Plan- 
tations " without the approbation of two men within 
each Town, upon forfeiture of ten shillings to the 
Country-" Thus watchful of the interests of artisans 
was the General Court, in early times. And its inter- 
ference then was provident — it ensured the supply of 



ITS TRADES AND COMMERCE. 155 

necessaries at a period when their acquisition was 
difficult, and when their failure would have been 
deeply felt. It was therefore encouraging. We 
should not, any of us, like it now. Of course not, 
for we have grown big! Labor is endlessly multi- 
plied. Production heaps our warehouses. We have 
plenty of leather— the best — and the name of calves 
is Legion. Who can't eat veal now — without com- 
punction too on the score of the tanner's product — 
and calve's-foot jelly to boot, not to speak of that 
tempting best part of the cow's child, the delicious 
sweet-bread ? 

As to the commerce of the Town, though subject 
to interruptions from the hostile or wayward conduct 
of the Indians, and from occasional scarcity, it was 
considerable for the time. The system, in this re- 
spect, by which the Settlers were governed, though in 
some aspects peculiar, yet embraced many of the 
principles and practices which obtain at the present 
day. The theoretical doctrines of production, distri- 
bution and consumption, we do not suppose ever 
puzzled their brains, but, guided by a few maxims of 
common sense, they went on to smite industriously 
both land and sea for tribute. 

They had their money, of course — but their 'Abra- 
hams' did not ' weigh' ont to their ' Ephrons' of busi- 
ness any shekels of silver, nor did they get much of 
the precious metals even by tale, nor bank paper at 
all, but corn, pease, beaver and wampum chiefly 
formed their circulating medium. Most of their ex- 
changes were made in kind — commodity for com- 
modity. They had their system of accounting — aim- 



156 HARTFORD. 

pie but effective. They used the instrumentality, to 
every extent necessary with them, of business paper. 
They had their merchants, or chapmen as they are 
sometimes called in the Records, to mediate their ex- 
changes. Two of these were particularly eminent — 
Governor Hopkins and Mr. Whiting — men whose un- 
tiring mercantile industry and skill contributed large- 
ly to the good of the Town. They had their ware- 
houses. These were at first, however, but few in 
number, and were concentrated chiefly in present 
Governors Street, and at the two Landings. They 
had their trading-houses, scattered not only through 
the Town, but also in the country, where ' the benefit 
and liberty of free trade,' with the exclusive use of a 
number of acres of ground, were frequently bestowed 
by act of the General Court, upon certain merchants, 
as at Waranoke upon Governor Hopkins, and at 
Pawcatuck on Thomas Stanton. Thus did trade be- 
gin at once to lay the nest eggs of new settlements 
throughout Connecticut. Hartford very early too, 
1643, had its Market, and established by law, to be 
held weekly, every Wednesday, and for the sale and 
exchange of " all manner of commodities that should 
be brought in, for cattle or any merchandize whatso- 
ever." In addition to this, 1645, the Town had two 
Fairs instituted by law, " to be kept yearly, one upon 
the second Wednesday of May, the other the second 
Wednesday in September." Once a week then, and 
upon grander occasions, twice every year, Hartford 
became a mart for the whole surrounding country, 
under the auspices of the supreme authority of the 
State — a fact true, in the period of which we speak, 



ITS TRADES AND COMMERCE. 157 

of no other town in Connecticut — a fact that shows 
for our Town, even at its birth, a superior business 
activity and importance. In the years that have 
since flown, she has amply sustained this predomin- 
ance, and will, we trust, to the end of time. Long 
may her merchants and tradesmen take pride in her 
commercial character — vie in noble effort with every 
other town in the creations of industry, and exalt, be- 
yond the success of other competitions, the horns of 
her plenty ! 

While thus in early times provided with Markets 
and Fairs, Hartford, through her own and the foster- 
ing legislation of the Colony, took great pains in the 
production of her commodities. She established in- 
spection laws, particularly for her pipe staves, and 
leather, and her yarn, both linen and woolen. . Her 
weights and measures were carefully regulated — they 
were every year, through the Town Clerk, to be com- 
pared and tried by standards fixed by the Court. 
Her chief articles of commerce, besides corn, pipe 
staves and skins, were deal boards, pork, beef, biscuit, 
wool, cider, beer and tar. 

Of these articles corn, though occasionally, as just 
after the Pequot War, quite scarce, was most of the 
time abundant, and at some periods was to be found 
in great profusion. In 1644, for example, we hear of 
a 'multitude of sellers' of this commodity, of an 
' overfilling,' from our River, of the markets of Mas- 
sachusetts and Plymouth, and orders are made for its 
transportation, through the two chief merchants of 
Hartford, Governor Hopkins and Mr. Whiting, into 
' parts beyond the seas.' Pipe staves seem always to 



158 HARTFORD. 

be in abundance, as might naturally be expected, and 
are always in demand. They are the frequent sub- 
ject of regulations, as to size, price, inspection, and 
exportation, both by the Town and the General 
Court. Beaver and other skins were of course nu- 
merous, but the trade in these, so far as the Indi- 
ans were concerned, was committed to the exclusive 
charge of one or more men appointed in each town — 
in Hartford to, Mr. Whiting and Thomas Stanton. 
Of articles exported from the Town, and of those 
consumed or used in it, a few, in consequence of the 
purchase of the Fort at Saybrook in 1644, and the 
agreement with Mr. Fenwick, had for ten years to 
pay a peculiar duty. Grain exported was taxed 
two pence per bushel — biscuit sixpence per hundred 
weight — beaver two pence per pound — every hogs- 
head of beer twenty shillings — while for every hog 
killed in the town twelve pence per annum was ex- 
acted, and twelve pence per annum for every milch 
cow «n- mare of three years old and upwards. These 
payments, to be made in beaver, wampum, wheal. 
barley or pease, at the common rates, were punctually 
exacted, and made over to Mr. Fenwick or his as- 
signs, till the terms of the bargain were fulfilled. 

To conduct the commerce of the new settlement, 
the citizens had their boats, their ketches, their pinks, 
their pinnaces, and their shallops — of from a few to 
even ninety tons burthen. They had ample materials 
for ship building around them, and they improved 
them — timber of oak, pine and spruce for masts, oak 
boards and pine boards, and tar, pitch and hemp. 
The manufacture of these last two articles, as well as 



ITS TRADES AND COMMERCE. 159 

the supply of cordage, and the employment of ship 
carpenters and ropers, were specially encouraged by 
the General Court. The Court went so far in one in- 
stance as to employ a committee of its own to build 
a ship. It gave facilities to ship owners for procuring 
freight. It exempted all seamen from training, and 
imposed on them only the light restraints of not 
weighing anchor on Sunday, and of carefully paying 
the Fort dues at Saybrook. It attempted, for the 
purpose of encouraging marine industry, to establish 
fisheries and salt-works upon Long Island. It gave 
to one Hartford merchant, Mr. Whiting, the monopo- 
ly for seven years, ' within the liberties' of Connecti- 
cut, of taking whale. It provided for another Hart- 
ford merchant, Governor Hopkins, who in 1640 un- 
dertook to furnish a vessel for the supply of cotton 
wool — it provided, and the fact is worthy of note, 
that, in consideration of this the first attempt of the 
kind to introduce, on anything like a large scale, a 
commodity so valuable, the towns upon the river, all, 
on the return of the vessel, should ' by proportion 
take off the cotton,' and pay for it in English corn or 
pipe staves. 

Thus encouraged, Hartford merchants freighted 
their vessels with the products of their town and 
country, and started them forth to pursue the glorious 
windings of the Connecticut, and kiss the Sound, 
and vex the seas — on to Boston, to Newfoundland, to 
New York, to Delaware, to Barbadoes, to Jamaica, to 
the Caribbee Islands, on occasionally even to Fayal 
and to the Wine and Madeira Isles. What did they 
bring back? Clothing chiefly at first, of various 



160 



HARTFORD. 



kinds, implements of husbandry, live stock at times, 
sugar, scythes, nails, glass, pewter, brass, fire-arms, 
cutlery-ware, rum, wine, cotton wool, and ' some 
money.' Such was the " Golden Fleece" of the little 
primitive marine of Hartford — and it was one which 
Jason and his Argonauts, back in the infancy and ex- 
periment of Greek commerce, might have envied! 
Clothes and utensils " wherewithal to work and sub- 
due a country!" Return cargoes of the necessaries 
and comforts of life — what better — all save perhaps, 
as some will think, the rum — but even this long-suf- 
fering, and patient, though almost proscribed member 
of the family of merchandise, was in the olden time, 
says officially the Colony of Connecticut, needed " to 
refresh the spirits of such as labored in the extreme 
heat and cold, to serve his Majesty's enlargement of 
Dominions" — and as for wine, who will question St. 
Paul's 'little' dose of this, or doubt that, in the lan- 
guage of record, it " did good unto the hearts of our 
wilderness people ?" Whatever may be thought on 
these points, it is at all events sure proof of the com- 
mercial activity of the Settlers that at a time when 
rum and wine were not common, when in the old 
country their use was confined almost exclusively, 
like the potato and the cauliflower, to the nobles 
and the rich, they, these dwellers in the woods of a 
New World, had these articles, and in abundance 
enough too to warrant, early as 1643, a Temperance 
Law — the first upon our Statute Book ! Their com- 
merce certainly was, for their time, and under their 
circumstances, large — creditable alike to their indus- 
try, their energy, and their boldness! Soeva. 



farffarlL 



THE SCHOOL— THE CHURCH— THE GRAVE— DOWN 
TO 1650. 

No. 17. 

'• There in his noisy mansion, skilled to rule, 
The village master taught his little school." 

Goldsmith. 



"Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way." 
" The deep, damp vault, the darkness and the worm." 



Id. 



Young. 



The School ! Of course it continued to exist with 
the Settlers, for they, almost all, had themselves fed 
on the pabulum of education. They knew its sweet- 
ness, its vital nourishment, the quick, noble energies 
it inspires, and its glorious fruitage. And their " wee 
ones" were many, for they were a prolific race. How 
their baptisms stare one in the face in the second vol- 
ume of our Town Records ! They gathered their off- 
spring numerously " as the hen gathereth her chickens 
under her wings" — and tended them with as much 
care, till feathered and firm with years, the adolescent 
bipeds could take care of themselves. It is not how- 
21 



162 HARTFORD. THE SCHOOL 

ever until 1642, thai we find any direct notice in the 
records of their School, though beyond doubt it exist- 
ed before. Then, December sixth, thirty pounds are 
settled upon it. Again, 1643, it is directed that six- 
teen pounds a year shall be paid to Mr. Andrews for 
keeping it. This is William Andrews. He is the first 
Town Schoolmaster then mentioned in our Records. 

He lived on the north corner of the present Elm 
and Bliss Streets, and had a house on this site. 
Wonder if he kept school there] Probably he did. 
Wonder how he kept it! Was he ' skilled to rule?' 
Did his ' boding tremblers' learn to trace 

" The day's disasters in his morning's fa* 

Or was he kind? Had he his 'jokes' — and if 'severe 
in aught,' was 

" The love lie bore to learning nil his fault?" 

Who can tell? And what did he teach? A. B. C's, 
writing, and arithmetic, of course. The Psalter, of 
course. His pupils sucked too, doubtless, the "Milk 
for Babes" that Catechism by John Cotton, while 
their master devoured the " Meat for Strong- Men" by 
the same eminent divine. How interesting his biog- 
raphy would be, as that of the first man probably in 
our Town who taught 'the young idea how to shoot!' 
But Time, that devourer, has eaten up his idiosyncra- 
sy along with the 'one head' that carried 'all he 
knew' — so that even that day and night-dream of all 
that relates to schools and schoolmasters, our pres- 
ent able State Superintendent of Common Schools, 
would not be able to enlighten us about his history. 



THE CHURCH THE GRAVE. 163 

The same act which gave Mr. Andrews his sixteen 
pounds a year, provides that the Town shall pay for 
the schooling of the poor, and for all deficiencies — a 
noble, beneficent provision, that clutches and applies 
at once, in all its strength, that grand principle of 
public support for education, which, more than aught 
besides, has given to Connecticut its prosperity and 
its glory — a principle which was not confined by the 
Settlers, be it marked, to the Town alone, but which, 
in a contribution required, of almost every family, of 
the quarter part of a bushel of corn, or grain and pro- 
visions, or of something equivalent thereto, and of a 
part of twenty pounds, was extended to the mainte- 
nance of poor scholars, and to the support of a fel- 
lowship in the College at Cambridge, Massachusetts ! 

Hartford's first School-house, lamely made up with- 
out doubt, like ' the straggling fence' that skirted it, 
soon wore out — and we find the Town, 1648, appro- 
priating forty pounds for a new one, and individuals 
are requested to add to this sum, since the want of 
" better conveniency in schooling hath been both un- 
comfortable to those who have been employed in that 
service, and prejudicial to the work under hand, which 
is looked upon as conducing much to the good of the 
present age, and that of the future.'''' Reflection most 
profound ! Philosophy most solid and immortal ! 
Aye, Spirits of the Founders of our Town, that "Fu- 
ture Age" your wise forecast embraced, and for which 
so signally in love and hope ye strove, now after 
Time has rolled the circuit of two hundred years, 
pours from the deep, firm-walled, magnificent Fount 



164 HARTFORD. THE SCHOOL 

ye established, pours back that floodlight of knowl- 
edge which your vision touched, and writes and illu- 
minates upon your tombs the epitaph of " Blessed !" 
From the School to the Church — that first one of 
Hartford, whose organization we have already, in a 
former Article, explained. What was its progress 
during the First Period? In attendance, considera- 
ble — for in 1644, the Settlers had to build a gallery in 
their Meeting-house to accommodate the increased 
number of worshippers. The Church gained also in 
equipment — for by 1640 it had obtained a be//, and 
Thomas Woodford first taught its clapper ' how to 
strike.' He was the first Bell-Ringer of Hartford! 
What an improvement — that Bell — over the drum, 
that of Farmington for instance, which was used " to 
call folks to meeting on Sunday," and over the hoarse 
resounding conch shells elsewhere used in olden time ! 
Its voice was dulcet in comparison, and must have 
been to the Settlers, amid the wild echoes of their 
new home, imposing even as is to the Parisians at 
the present day the voice of the " Emanuel"* of their 
Notre Dame, whose clapper alone enforces tones with 
the weight of nine hundred and seventy-six pounds ! 
The church also gained in time — for in 1640 Henry 
Packs, by will, bestowed ' uppon' it " the Clocke 
which [his] Brother Thorneton had bought!" But it 
did not long adorn the old Meeting- House, for this, 
rudely built at first, though from time to time new 
clapboarded, and furnished with a gallery, and with a 
porch, and with new stairs that ' led up into its cham- 

* Name of the Bell. 



THE CHURCH THE GRAVE. 165 

ber,' yielded at last to decay, and in 1649 was given 
by the Town to Mrs. Hooker. The clock doubtless 
passed to the new Meeting-house, and clicked, we 
trust, with special accuracy, the devotional hours to 
which it was consecrated. 

But how many souls, during the First Period, did 
the First Church of Hartford save ? We know not. 
How many persons adopt into its membership ? We 
know not. How many excommunicate from its em- 
brace ? But one that we can learn — Matthew Al- 
len — and this distinguished Settler without cause, he 
says, and unjustly, for in 1644 he presented several 
petitions to the General Court " in regard of his cen- 
sure of excommunication," affirming that he had been 
' wronged,' and he was ordered to bring into Court 
the particulars of his accusation. But he did not. 
Yet we shall never believe him guilty of anything 
sinful or heinous — for he was a good man, a just 
man, a high-minded man, and one of the props of 
the Colony. Perhaps he entertained sentiments on 
baptism, church-membership, or church discipline, va- 
riant from those of a majority of the church, and so 
" fell under the ban," as did others, not many years 
after, for the same cause. The South Congregational 
Church in this City, is the offspring, 1670, of difficul- 
ties of this character. Yet notwithstanding these, 
the First Church in Hartford, during the period under 
consideration, enjoyed generally great harmony, and 
was nourished all the while with intense care. Very 
soon, 1644, the maintenance of ministers, which for 
nine years previously had been purely voluntary on 



166 



HARTFORD, 



THE SCHOOL' 



/ 



the part of the people, was made by law compulsory. 
Good for the clergy! "Let the trees of the field" 
ecclesiastical throughout Connecticut " clap their 
hands!" " Let the [pulpit] hills be joyful together!" 
Two persons indeed were first to solicit contributions 
for the Church, but in case any one refused ' to pay a 
meet proportion,' he was then to be " rated by author- 
ity in some just and equal way," and the civil power 
was to be exercised in collecting " as in other just 
debts." 

By the Church a Burying- Yard, of course. We 
have to notice such Yard here again, because the 
Town, 1640, appointed a new one, of which we have 
not spoken, and because this new one contains distin- 
guished dust. It U'as " Richard Olmsted's lot," and 
for this the Town gave him a parcel of ground lying 
at the North Meadow gate, and called the Cow Yard. 
It is the present Yard in the rear of the Centre 
Church, only in former times it was larger than now. 
Heaps of bones, as well as coffins, in digging cellars 
for Kellogg's and for Robinson's buildings, and in 
sinking the foundation of the Church at the north- 
west corner, were carefully taken up and removed 
within the present enclosure. Thomas Woodford, 
the Bell-Ringer and Crier of the Town, was also the 
first Sexton of this Yard. He was 'to attend the 
making of graves for any corpses deceased' — to lay 
no corpse less than four feet deep — to lay none 'above 
four years old less than five feet deep' — none ' above 
ten less than six feet deep.' He was to keep each 
grave 'in seemly repair, so that it [should] be known 
in future time,' and for one of ' the lesser sort' was to 



THE CHURCH THE GRAVE. 167 

receive two shillings and sixpence, for one of 'the 
middle sort' three shillings, and for one of 'the high- 
est sort' three shillings and sixpence. 

What, we wonder, would the lineal successor of 
Thomas Woodford say, our present worthy 'man and 
boy' Sexton of 'thirty years,' if the 'well-plumed' 
hearses of our day came ' nodding on' to his beautiful 
" Spring Grove Cemetery," but to leave him for all 
his painful care, less than four shillings — two shillings 
even and a meagre sixpence ? He ' builds stronger 
than a mason, a shipwright, or a carpenter' — we have 
Shakspeare's authority for this — but would he, for the 
lean compensation of Hartford's first sexton, build the 
house that ' lasts till doomsday,' and let the dead ' sup 
with their progenitors ?' Marry, we think not. He 
could not, now a days, long 'live upon the dead' at 
the primitive rates of burial, unless some pestilence 
should huddle corpses. Yet he's a kind-hearted old 
man, and would not, for all the world, let a poor body 
go ' ungraved.' Strange that the familiars of death, 
your sextons and your hangmen, are remarkable for 
sensibility ! 

But who did Thomas Woodford, or his successor 
within the First Period, bury ? 

James 01 instead — William Spencer — Thomas Scott — 
Seth Grant — William Butler — Robert Day — Daniel 
Sled, who was an infant son of our first Town 
Clerk — Timothy Standley — Gov. George Wyllys — and 
Rev. Tliomas Hooker. 

Also the following — whose names have been kindly 
furnished us by our friend J. Hammond Trumbull 
Esq. — to wit: Thomas Johnson, "the cobler," as he is 



168 HARTFORD. THE SCHOOL 

called in the order of the Court for the settlement of 
his estate — the first wife of the Rev. Samuel Stone, 
who, according to Mr. Hooker, " smoaked out her 
days in the darknesse of melancholie" — Richard Ly- 
man, and soon after him his widow — Thomas Crump, 
a servant or retainer of Gov. Hopkins — John Pur- 
chas — " Mistress Cullick" supposed to have been the 
first wife of Capt. John Cullick, Secretary of the Col- 
ony from 1648 to 1658 — Richard Sawyer — William 
Whiting — and " Goody Bets." Upon these last three, 
Mr. Trumbull remarks as follows : 

'■'■Richard Sawyer, who died in 1648, was a hired 
servant or retainer of Capt. Cullick. His inventory 
would lead us to infer that servants in those days 
were at least as well dressed as their masters, — or 
that Richard Sawyer was an exception to the general 
rule, which forbade all persons to ' exceede their con- 
dition and ranks,' in ' excesse of apparell.' Richard 
had, a ' musk colored cloth doublet,' a ' bucks leather 
doublet,' a ' calves' leather doublet,' a ' liver colored 
doublet and jacket and breeches,' a 'hair colored 
jacket and breeches,' a ' stuff jacket,' 'green knit 
hose,' ' colored hats,' &e. &c, with a good supply of 
the minor accessories of a well furnished wardrobe. 

"William Wliiting, a prominent, wealthy and influen- 
tial citizen of the Colony, and one of its magistrates, 
died July, 1647. He was largely interested in trade 
and commerce ; was for several years Treasurer of 
the Colony, and seems to have been relied on by the 
General Court for the transaction of all business re- 
quiring the investment of large capital or the exercise 
of financial skill. In conjunction with his friend and 



THE CHURCH' 



•THE GRAVE. 



169 



partner, Gov. Hopkins, he was entrusted with a mo- 
nopoly of the exportation of corn and grain raised in 
the Colony ; and in 1647, the Court granted him the 
exclusive privilege of prosecuting the whale fishery, 
for seven years ; a design which he did not live to 
carry into execution. His estate was inventoried at 
.£2854 — a large fortune for that period. 

"'Goody Bets,' was 'the School-dame: It appears 
then that Hartford, at this early period, had at least 
two schools ; the one, taught by William Andrews, an 
accomplished clerk and scholar, (as the records which 
are yet preserved, in his exact and beautiful penman- 
ship, sufficiently indicate ;) and another, probably un- 
der more humble auspices, as a primary school — 

' Lest weakly wights of smaller size should stray, 
Eager, perdie, to bask in sunny clay ! 
Where sat the dame, disguised in look profound, 
And eyed her fairy throng, and turned her -wheel around.' 

The ' School Master' was a dignitary in his way. 
He received a salary from the town. He rejoiced in 
the prefix of ' Mr.,' at a period when such titles had a 
significancy which rarely attaches to honorary titles 
now-a-days. The mistress of the 'woman's school' 
held, of course, a somewhat humbler position. 

' No pompous title did debauch her ear ! 
Goody, good woman, gossip, n'aunt, forsooth, — 
Or Dame, — the sole additions she did hear!' 

"All that I can learn of her or her school, is contained 
in the brief record of her death which I have quoted. 
Yet doubtless there were many of the future Magis- 
trates and Ministers and public men of the Colony, 
22 



170 HARTFORD. THE SCHOOL 

who conned their first lessons, from the horn book, at 
Goody Betts' side, in her little school-room." 

Doubtless other persons than those now men- 
tioned — quite a number — died within the period un- 
der consideration. Not a record of them, however, 
that we can find, remains — not even a head or a foot 
stone. But of those whose names we have given, 
there were Governor Huyncs and Mr. Hooker — highly 
distinguished both, as the Reader is aware. Let us 
notice them briefly— and so conclude. 

The first spent but a short time in the New 
World — but six years — ere he was called to his rest. 
Born in the hereditary mansion of Fenny Compton, 
at Knapton, in the County of "Warwick, in England, 
where he enjoyed an estate of five hundred pounds a 
year, he came to this country in 1638, and settled up- 
on the hill long known as the Wyllys Hill, the pres- 
ent Charter Oak Place. In 1639, he was chosen into 
the magistracy of the Colony, and again in 1640. In 
1641 he was elected Deputy Governor ; in 1642 Gov- 
ernor, and after this continued to occupy the post of 
Assistant till his death — which occurred March 9th, 
1644 — (1645 according to the present computation.) 
His position was always a leading one in the Colony. 
He took great interest in agriculture — had a large 
landed estate, and employed many men. He was a 
devout Puritan, earnest in his love for undefiled relig- 
ion, exact in his attention to divine ordinances and 
worship, peculiarly careful of the education of his 
children, dignified yet affable in his deportment, and 
was beloved by all. He lies buried in the old Yard 



THE CHURCH THE GRAVE. 171 

of the Centre Church, directly beneath, or close by 
the monument erected to the memory of the First 
Settlers, and there repose the bones of his family 
down to the present time. He never had a monu- 
ment, nor did any one of his distinguished family 
have one. In this respect they were peculiar. One 
of the latest male members being asked why they did 
not follow the custom in this respect, replied, in the 
impulse of a strong pride, that " if the State of Con- 
necticut could not remember the. Wyllyses without a 
monument, their memory might rot!" Peace to the 
ashes of the worthy old third Governor of Con- 
necticut ! * 

"Brother, I am going- to receive mercy" said Tlwm- 
as Hooker, in the sixty-first year of his age, to one 
who stood by his couch when dying — and " closing 
his eyes with his own hands, and gently stroking his 
own forehead, he gave a little groan, and so expired 
his blessed soul into the arms of his fellow-servants, 
the holy angels, on July 7th, 1647." " In memory of 
the Rev. Thomas Hooker," says a modern inscription 
on an original monument over his grave,f " who in 
1636, with his assistant, Mr. Stone, removed to Hart- 
ford with about 100 persons, where he planted ye first 
church in Connecticut — an able, eloquent and faithful 
minister of Christ. He died July 7th, JEt LXI." 

* See a biographical sketch of him, from our own pen, in the Connecticut 
Courant of September 8th, 1845. 

t By Hon. Seth Terry, of Hartford. The monument in the Centre Bury- 
ing Yard, consists of a plain slab of red sandstone or freestone, about five 
inches in thickness, raised on blocks of the same, a short distance from the 
ground. 



172 HARTFORD. THE SCHOOL 

This founder and father of Hartford was born at 
Marshfield, England, and was a man eminent alike 
for his piety, his learning, his prudence, and his ener- 
gy. A graduate of Emanuel College, Cambridge, in 
youth, says Trumbull, "he received the spirit of adop- 
tion, and was enabled to exhibit a life of the most ex- 
emplary patience and goodness. Naturally a man of 
strong and lively passions, he obtained a happy gov- 
ernment of himself. In his day he was one of the 
most animated and # powerful preachers in New En- 
gland. In conversation he was pleasant and enter- 
taining, but always grave. He was affable, conde- 
scending and charitable. Yet his appearance and 
conduct were with such becoming majesty, authority 
and prudence, that he would do more with a word, or 
a look, than other men could with a severe discipline. 
It was not an uncommon thing for him to give away 
five or ten pounds at a time to poor widows, orphans, 
and necessitous people" — a charity he was fortunate- 
ly able to perform, for he was rich for the time — his 
estate, upon his decease, being appraised at thirteen 
hundred and thirty-six pounds and fifteen shillings, of 
which his library alone was valued at three hundred 
pounds. " He was," say Edward Hopkins and Wil- 
liam Goodwin, his cotemporaries, " one of a thousand 
whose diligence and unweariedness, besides his other 
endowments in the work committed to him, were 
almost beyond compare." He was distinguished for 
his excellence in prayer. It was observed, says his bi- 
ographer Edward W. Hooker,* " that his prayer was. 

* We commend his little work to the Reader. It will amply repay perusal. 



THE CHURCH THE GRAVE. 173 

usually like Jacob's ladder^ wherein the nearer he 
came to the end, the nearer he drew to heaven, and 
he grew into such rapturous pleadings with God and 
praisings of God, as made some to say that, like the 
master of the feast, he reserved the best wine until 
the last." Hooker, says Bancroft, was a man " of 
vast endowments, a strong will, and an energetic 
mind; ingenuous in his temper, and open in his pro- 
fessions ; trained to benevolence by the discipline of 
affliction ; versed in tolerance, by. his refuge in Hol- 
land ; choleric, yet gentle in his affections ; firm in his 
faith, yet readily yielding to the power of reason ; the 
peer of the reformers, without their harshness; the 
devoted apostle to the humble and the poor ; severe 
towards the proud; mild in his soothing* of a wound- 
ed spirit ; glowing ' with the raptures of devotion, and 
kindling with the messages of redeeming love ; his 
eye, voice, gesture and whole frame animate with the 
living vigor of a heartfelt religion; public spirited and 
lavishly charitable ; and ' though persecutions and 
banishments had awaited him, as one wave follows 
another,' ever serenely blest with a ' glorious peace of 
soul ;' fixed in his trust in Providence, and his adhe- 
sion to that cause of advancing civilization which he 
cherished always, even while it remained to him a 
mystery. This was he, whom, for his abilities and 
services, his cotemporaries placed ' in the first rank of 
men,' praising him as ' the one rich pearl with which 
Europe more than repaid America for the treasures 
from her coast.'" 

With this testimony, both clerical and lay, to the 
character of Hooker, we cheerfully coincide. Fare- 



174 HARTFORD. 

well, Venerable Saint! Thou art in heaven — sure! 
Listen a moment there to voices now, which, in the 
tones of infancy, the shouts of youth, the peal of 
manhood, and the whispers of age, would fain make 
themselves heard in thine immortal ear, while, in 
thanksgiving to thee, and thy God, and their God, 
they pour in one royal song from twenty thousand 
happy Dwellers in the Town which Thou didst found, 
and where thy Spirit lingers still ! 

Sc^va. 



artfortL 



ITS CHIEF FUNCTIONARIES— DOWN TO 1650. 

No. 18. 

" Who the prime actors of that olden scene, 

So full of purpose high and faith serene? 

Their tireless energy most surely claims 

The memory of at least their names." Anon. 

Who did it — a .question momently on the lips of 
somebody or other anxious to know human agents in 
deeds however grave or trivial. Put for any purpose 
of folly, of indolence, or of sin, and it is a question 
that wastes breath, wastes intellect, and wastes char- 
acter. But put in order to learn the authors of good 
deeds, to ascertain those particularly, who, in Church 
and State, have moved the machinery of society and 
advanced its civilization, it is then the question of 
the mind's thirst — of the mind panting for knowl- 
edge, for that which we may love, and venerate, and 
imitate, and think upon — and thoughts, we know, " are 
heard in heaven." Of augmented interest the ques- 
tion under this view — deep, lofty, thrilling — when it 
involves those personally dear to us — when it sum- 
mons our own immediate progenitors, whose blood 
throbs in our own veins, the Founders of our own 



176 HARTFORD. 

family, our own Town, our own Commonwealth, 
when it summons these 

" To breathe the enlivening spirit, and to fix 
The generous purpose in the glowing breast." 

Scaeva has had occasion already to notice many such 
in his history of the founding and of the progress 
of Hartford, during its First Period. They have 
been welcome visitors, we trust, to the Dwellers in 
this Town. However faint the traces of them which 
Time has spared, you, and you, and you, Reader, 
can not have failed to recognize in them some of 
your own lineaments, for they, the parents of Hart- 
ford, were your parents too, 

" And worthy seem; for in their looks 
The image of their glorious Maker shone, 
Truth, wisdom, sanetitude severe and pure — 
Whence true authority in men." 

Far as we could describe, you have seen the work of 
our Town for its first fourteen years. Who now, be- 
sides those with whose names you are already famil- 
iar, performed this work? As chief instruments, as 
the trusted agents of the primitive community, ivho 
did it? We can show you, in civil life, nearly 
all — the town's Selectmen, its Clerk, its Constables, 
and its members of the General Court — and this we 
propose to do. But alas it is with their names alone? 
save in a case or two, that we can deal. Aught in 
the shape of their biography is in most instances im- 
possible, for we can pluck nothing scarcely from the 
' wallet' which Time, " on his broad pinions swifter 



ITS CHIEF FUNCTIONARIES. 177 

than the wind," carries at his back. Would that we 
could ! 

Who then, first, were the Selectmen, in the Period 
upon which we dwell? For the sake of complete- 
ness we shall give the names of all that we can ascer- 
tain, whether they have been mentioned in former 
Articles, or not, and in the order so far as is practica- 
ble, of the years of their service. 

Previous to 1639, we find the names of but three, 
viz. : John Talcott, William Wadsworth, and Samuel 
Wakeman. 

In 1639, and after, down to 1650, they are recorded 
as follows : 

In 1639, William Westwood, William Spencer, Na- 
thaniel Ward, and John Moody. 

In 1640, William Pantry, Andrew Bacon, John Hop- 
kins, and William Lawes. 

In 1641, John White, John Pratt, Richard Goodman, 
and Joseph Mygatt. 

In 1642, William Wadsworth, Timothy Stanley, 
Thomas Hosmer, and William Gibbins. 

In 1643, John Outlet, John Talcott, Nathaniel Ely, 
and George Steele. 

In 1644, Nathaniel Ward, Richard Lord, Nathaniel 
Richards, and John Barnard. 

In 1645, William Pantry, John White, Gregory 
Wilterton and William Lawes. 

In 1646, William Westwood, Richard Goodman, 
Thomas Hosmer, and Joseph Mygatt. 

In 1647, Nathaniel Ward, William Wadsworth, 
Edivard Stebbing, and George Stocking. 
23 



178 HARTFORD. 

In 1648, John Talcott, Richard Webb, John Bar- 
nard, and Richard Butler. 

In 1649, John Wilcox, George Graves, Nathaniel 
Ely, and William Phillips. 

The Town Clerkship, from the establishment of 
the office in 1639, down to 1650, remained in the 
hands of John Steele. This same individual filled the 
same office also for Farmington, from the commence- 
ment of this Town about 1645, down through the 
First Period of our History, Mr. Steele having been, 
by the General Court, particularly " intreated for the 
present to be recorder, there, untill the Towne have 
one fitt among themselves." The constant Represen- 
tative of Hartford in the General Court till his re- 
moval to Farmington, well informed, a man of busi- 
ness, judicious, grave, godly — such was John Steele. 

We trust that upon this announcement our present 
Town Clerk, with all the reverence due to the stock 
from which he is officially descended, will pause over 
that desk where, honest, industrious gentleman, he is 
ever at work, and turn to contemplate his great Orig- 
inal, and the glorious legacy he has left to his success- 
or of personal worth, and pious devotion, and clerical 
ability. We doubt not that he will — that he often 
does — for somewhere, prominent on a page of one of 
the volumes of Town Records, not far from the tall 
desk over which he bends, is written the following 
reference — Jeremiah, Chap, xxxn., vs. 9, 10, 11, 12. 
Ah ! — the Clerk that thus calls in the Bible, as well as 
man, to legitimate his vocation, and inspire him with 
a sense of responsibility — true descendant of John 
Steele must he surely be ! Little did we dream be- 



ITS CHIEF FUNCTIONARIES. 179 

fore that the Town had in him so devout an officer — 
yet here we find him tracing his pedigree back to 
Jeremiah's time — back to " Baruch the son of Ne- 
riah, the son of Maaseiah" — and invoking the spirit 
"which [was] in the country of Benjamin," thou- 
sands of years ago, to preside over his pen while he 
takes the ' evidences, this evidence of purchase,' and 
that, and that, and another, and all that he can get, 
and 'puts them' — no not, like Baruch, 'in an earthen 
vessel,' but in a Book, " that they may continue many 
days!" We congratulate the Town that it has a 
Clerk who possesses so godly a spirit — that 

" With him Gospel and Deeds each has its column — 
His head an index to the sacred volume; 
His very name a title page; and next 
His life a commentary on the text." 

The Constables of Hartford, down to 1639, those 
of whom we can find mention, were two only, viz. : 
Samuel Wake man and Jeremy Adams. Subsequent to 
these, and down to 1650, were — in 1639, Nathaniel 
Ely and Thomas Hosmer — in 1640, Thomas Olcott 
and Arthur Smith — in 1.641, Nathan Richards and 
Stephen Post — in 1642, Richard Lord and Gregory 
Wilterton, the latter a man who was born in the 
reign of Queen Bess, who used to tell stories to the 
Settlers about the " Virgin Queen," and who now lies 
interred, with a monument above him, behind the 
Centre Church — in 1643, Thomas Stanton and Wil- 
liam Hills — in 1644, John Pratt and Nathaniel Wil- 
lett — in 1645, we have no record of any — in 1646, 
William Gibbins and Richard Olmstead — in 1647, 



180 HARTFORD. 

Thomas Stanley and Thomas Burr — in 1648, William 
Pantry and James Ensign — and in 1649, Nathaniel 
Richards and Thomas Selden. 

Of the above, Samuel Wakeman deserves particular 
notice, as having been the first Constable of Hartford, 
and consequently the great progenitor of all who, 
since his time, have wielded in our Town and City 
the staff of constabular authority. He received his 
appointment April 26th, 1636, with two other officers 
like himself, one for Windsor and one for Wethers- 
field, in the first General Court held in the Colony of 
Connecticut. He was also one of our earliest Select- 
men. He enjoyed the special confidence of our prim- 
itive Legislature, for with George Hubbard he was 
appointed by this Body to survey and report upon the 
breadth of the whole township of Windsor, and with 
the addition of Ancient Stoughton for a colleague, 
was directed to perform the same duty for Wethers- 
field. Their joint report settling the bounds of these 
early sisters of Hartford, and moreover extending 
their territory, on the east side of Connecticut River, 
three miles to the eastward, was at once accepted and 
confirmed by the General Court. So Windsor and 
Wethersfield thank Samuel Wakeman, among others, 
for your primitive consequence in acres! Revere the 
memory of one who took at once a three-mile stride 
to enlarge your territorial domain — and shed a tear of 
pity over the fact that early as 1646, after being per- 
mitted to regale his senses with but a few roses only 
in the wilderness which he was aiding to make bud 
and blossom, he fell a victim to death, and left a son 



ITS CHIEF FUNCTIONARIES. 181 

and three daughters to the meagre patrimony, appar- 
ently, but of ninety pounds, and to the cold charity of 
the world ! 

May his lineal official successors, of this day, in 
our Town, all share his worth, but oh not his pecuni- 
ary fate ! To die and leave to three daughters and a 
son but ninety pounds — not enough, scarcely, to last 
" the best blood chambered in one's bosom" for six 
moons ! Why our own Sheriff Waterman could not 
lift his sinewy arm in duty, or sound his stentorian 
voice, with the prospect, when Sheriff Death attaches 
him, and Constables the Worms levy on his stalwart 
body, of leaving but Wakeman's pittance only to his 
bright babies two ! Nor could brave Deputy Alden 
do his duty — with no babies at all! The solemn 
melody of the Riot Act would never again, as recent- 
ly, thrill on his neatly-chiselled lips ! Nor could even 
an// Constable endure the prospect of Wakeman's 
fate ! Too sure it would be, at once, with the film of 
blindness to seal up both his eyes ! Too sure in a 
moment to paralyze his ministerial hand — that Hand 
which, stretched ever out in the sunlight of fees, 
when but touched by the spring of a warrant or a 
writ, and sometimes when untouched by the spring of 
either, clutches like the quick grasp of Fate, and with 
an iron and remorseless hug, squeezes both the collars 
and the dollars of all the subjects, liege or not liege, 
of her Majesty the Law! 

But to go on with our ' prime actors.' Who, dur- 
ing the First Period, were the Members of the Gener- 
al Court from Hartford, either as Magistrates or Dep- 



182 



HARTFORD, 



uties ? * Prior to the Constitution of 1639, they were 
John Steele, William Westwood, Thomas Welles, Wil- 
liam Whiting, John Webster, John Talcott, John Hay nes, 
John Hopkins and Andrew Bacon. 

The Members after the Constitution of 1639, and 
down to 1650, were as follows: 1. John Hay nes, Mag- 
istrate during the whole Period, and who was six 
times elected Governor, and three times Deputy Gov- 
ernor. 2. Edward Hopkins, Magistrate during the 
whole Period, and who was four times elected Gov- 
ernor, and four times Deputy Governor. 3. George 
Wyllys, Magistrate for a few years, six only, but con- 
stantly in office till he died in 1644. He was once 
elected Governor, and once Deputy Governor. 4. 
Thomas Welles, Magistrate during the whole Period, 
and most of this time either Secretary or Treasurer 
of the Colony. 5. John Webster, always a Magis- 
trate. 6. William Whiting, Magistrate for seven 
years, and for several years also the Treasurer of the 
Colony. 7. John Culliek, Magistrate and Secretary 
of the Colony for two years, and three years a Depu- 
ty. 8. John Steele, during the whole Period a Depu- 
ty. 9. John Talcott, the same. 10. Andrew Bacon, 
seven years a Deputy. 11. William Westwood, five 
years a Deputy. 12. Edward Stebbing, five years a 
Deputy. 13. John Pratt, two years a Deputy. 14. 
William Spenser, two years a Deputy. 

* Our arrangement apparent!}- limits the service of those whom we men- 
tion to the close of 1649. This to us is a matter of convenience, but it is not 
to be understood that their term of service, did, of course, thus expire. 
Many served after, and some long after 1650, as our Readers will have occa- 
sion to see, when we ' set foot' upon the Second Period of our Town History. 



ITS CHIEF FUNCTIONARIES. 183 

I 

The names we have given in the present Article, 
show the direct ancestors of a wonderfully large 
brood of bipeds, who walk about our streets to-day 
and snuff the air, and perhaps care not a fig whether 
they are descended from a man of consequence, a 
monkey, or a donkey. We trust, however, they may 
feel far otherwise. Reader, awake thy spirit! 

" Think through whom 
Thy life-blood tracks its parent lake, 
And then strike home!" 

SCiEVA. 



fartforl 



ITS CIVIL HISTORY — FROM 1650 TO 1665. 
PERIOD SECOND. 

No. 19. 

" Instructed by the antiquary times, 
He must, he is, he cannot but be wise." 

Shakspeare. 

" We love to feel within us the bond which unites the most distant eras. 
Men, nations, customs perish; the affections are immortal! they are the 
sympathies which unite the ceaseless generations ; the past lives ; when we 
look upon its emotions, it lives in our own. It is the magician's gift, that re- 
vives the dead, that animates the dust of forgotten graves. This is not the 
author's skill- it is in the heart of the reader." 

Last Days of Pompeii. 

Again, Hartford ho ! Are you ready, Reader, for 
another bout? We have given you digestion-time, 
breathing-time, after having carried you through the 
First Period of our Town History. We trust our 
Quill Horse drew you along safely, profitably, nay 
sweetly to yourself — that you have discovered no flaw 
in his primitive harness, and no fracture in his ancient 
chariot. If you have, "Old Grab, time out of mind" 
the antiquarian's as well as the " fames coachmaker," 
has refitted us, and we are ready for another start. 
The way is before us, and the signboard says " Road 
24 



186 



HARTFORD. 



through Hartford from 1650 to 1665 — Period 
Second." The Chariot door is open. Jump in — and 
may you have a pleasant ride ! 

First then, let us take a general view of the Period 
over which we are to journey. It is one, Reader, 
marked, in Colonial affairs, by collisions and difficul- 
ties with the Dutch and Indians ; by the final settle- 
ment, at a cost in the whole of about two thousand 
pounds, of the contract with Mr. Fenwick in relation 
to the Fort at Saybrook and the Right of Jurisdic- 
tion; by an amicable adjustment concluding the trib- 
ute from the Pequots ; by the arrival of three of the 
regicide judges of Charles the First, and by the pro- 
curement of that Charter of civil government under 
which Connecticut and New Haven united, and, for 
one hundred and fifty-three years, ran a happy, and in 
the main a prosperous career. The Dutch, ever disaf- 
fected with the encroachments, as they deemed them, 
of the Settlers here, with their vigilant industry, with 
their activity particularly in commerce, and with their 
acquisition of new territory and creation of new 
towns, and offended too by their noble spirit of pride, 
and by that portion of their policy, especially, which 
forbade foreigners to trade with the Indians in their 
vicinity, annoyed them with claims, menaced them, 
and endangered them by acts of violence. They 
plotted darkly for their entire extirpation. It was a 
fearful conspiracy — countenanced too, there is some 
reason to apprehend, by Stuyvesant himself, and cer- 
tainly most warmly nursed by his bosom friend, that 
'common pest of the Colonies,' the wily and implaca- 
ble Ninigrate. A Dutch fleet was expected from 



ITS CIVIL, HISTORY. 187 

abroad to join it, and a day, one Election Day, was 
supposed to have been fixed for a general massacre. 
The Dutch too seized and imprisoned English Set- 
tlers upon Long Island and at Delaware Bay, or 
drove them away. In some instances they burned 
their trading-houses — detained their goods — laid op- 
pressive imposts — and bought goods stolen from 
the English. They harbored fugitives from justice. 
They helped criminals to file off their irons and es- 
cape. In Hartford particularly they made their Fort 
on the Point a sanctuary for runaway servants and 
for felons — and while thus the Dutch, in various ways, 
were committing, in the language of the times, ' high 
and hostile injuries,' Ninigrate was attacking Indians, 
particularly on Long Island, who were in alliance 
with the English, and on many occasions Threatened 
and plundered the white inhabitants of Connecticut. 
He laid claim to the Pequot country. He was per- 
petually quarrelling with Uncas, and Uncas with 
him, and Uncas, proud and mischievous, with the 
Podunks. 

In consequence of all these circumstances, during 
the first four years particularly of the Second Period, 
there was much alarm, much public excitement, and 
depression in the business and prospects generally of 
the settlements upon the Connecticut. Agriculture, 
the great resource, was hindered, and to such an ex- 
tent as to render it necessary in 1652, in 1654, and 
again in 1662, specially to supervise, now to restrict, 
and now to prohibit entirely the exportation of pro- 
visions, save for ' some public concernments.' Exten- 



188 



HARTFORD, 



sive and expensive preparations were made for de- 
fence. Plans for raising troops, at one time for rais- 
ing five hundred, were set afoot, and partly carried in- 
to effect, and war would actually have occurred but 
for the unwise and wholly unjustifiable opposition of 
Massachusetts. A frigate of ten or twelve guns was 
kept cruising in the Sound, to protect the coast, and 
to prevent Ninigrate from crossing to Long Island. 
All Indians were sedulously watched. People were 
worn down with the labor of guarding — and this 
state of things continued till, in 1654, four or five 
ships, sent out from England by Cromwell to reduce 
the Dutch, arrived at Boston, the Dutch establishment 
in Hartford was sequestered, and the total defeat of 
Tromp's fleet compelled Holland to sue for peace. 
Nor was the relief then afforded complete. Embar- 
rassment still continued till, at the close of our Sec- 
ond Period, Connecticut and New Haven uniting un- 
der the Charter in one Assembly, the bounds of the 
Colony were settled, the Dutch of New York became 
English subjects, and the people, all, as in the Procla- 
mation at this time for a Thanksgiving is expressed, 
praised " the Supreme Benefactor for the blessings of 
liberty, health, peace, and plenty." 

Hartford, of course, shared largely in the events to 
which we have briefly alluded. Leading town, as it 
was, in numbers, wealth, and influence, seat of gov- 
ernment and centre of political correspondence and 
negotiations, as it was, its inhabitants found much in 
these events to give them peculiar anxiety, much to 
throw a cloud at times over their prospects, much to 
retard their prosperity, but much, after all, firm people 



ITS CIVIL HISTORY. 189 

as they were, hoping on, hoping ever, to stimulate 
them to wise thoughtfulness and active exertion. 
The amount for taxation which our Town had on the 
Colonial Grand List for 1651, was 22,404 pounds and 
19 shillings. Its amount, for the same purpose, was 
less than this every succeeding year down to 1665, 
and in 1664, was but 19,365 pounds, and 18 shil- 
lings — showing an actual diminution between the be- 
ginning and end of the Second Period, of three 
thousand and thirty-nine pounds and one shilling — a 
fact which plainly indicates, so far as regards the pe- 
cuniary prosperity of the Town, the presence of re- 
tarding causes. We have pointed them out, the 
principal ones. But in spite of all discouragements, 
the Settlers stuck bravely to their new home, and la- 
bored for its improvement. Their's were 

"spirits prompt to undertake, 
And not soon spent, though in an arduous cause." 

Let us see what they did, and to-day, as first in our 
plan of examination, let us look at their civil organi- 
zation, in part only, however, in the present Article, 
during the Period upon which we dwell. 

Were any changes made in their municipal policy ? 
None, we answer, of any fundamental importance. 
A few new offices were created, and of course new 
officers were added. Selectmen, chosen annually two 
from the north and two from the south side of the 
Riveret, still continued, as chief functionaries, to or- 
der the affairs of the Town. John Steele, the Town 
Clerk, continued to discharge his duties, till, in 1651, 
he was succeeded by William Andrews, the former 



190 HARTFORD. 

schoolmaster, and Andrews in turn, in 1655, by John 
Allen, and Allen in turn, in 1664, by another John 
Steele, the son doubtless of the first Recorder. Con- 
stables, Committees, Fence and Chimney- Viewers, 
and Sealers of weights and measures, went on as 
usual. The Town Guard was all the while carefully 
kept up — and it was provided that every person of 
able body, not specially exempted by law, should act 
in it, or procure a substitute, twelve pence a year be- 
ing allowed each man, in addition to wages, for re- 
pairing his arms. The Special Guard for the Meet- 
ing House, consisting usually of ten men, was con- 
tinued, and in addition to former powers was author- 
ized, through its chief sentinel and sergeant, to com- 
pel both boys and men who, thoughtless of worship, 
lounged without, to go within the sanctuary. A spe- 
cial guard also was created for the Governor, with an 
allowance particularly of half a pound of powder to 
a man upon Election Day, and with the restriction of 
never leaving duty but by permission from his Excel- 
lency. This is the first mention in our history of any 
particular military organization for the protection of 
the Chief Magistrate of Connecticut, and is doubt- 
less the origin, in principle, of each of the Companies 
which at present, in each of our Capitals, here and in 
New Haven, are known and act as the Governor's 
Guard. Thus " majesty doth hedge in a king," and 
sentinels do 

" wear upon their chins 
The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars" — 

properly enough, perhaps, provided the king doth 



ITS CIVIL HISTORY. 191 

dress himself with such humility as to ' pluck allegi- 
ance from men's hearts,' and provided the Majesty of 
the People doth ' hedge in' all ! 

To the officers formerly existing were added, in the 
Second Period, a Town Treasurer, Sealers of Leath- 
er, Custom Masters, Custodiers of the Meeting House, 
Packers, and a Brander of Horses. 

The duty of the Treasurer, or 'Husband for the 
Town] was "to preserve the Town Stock." The 
first person chosen to this office was Ensign John 
Talcott, in, 1659. 

The duty of Sealers of Leather was carefully to 
examine the article with which they were charged, 
and, if found good, to place upon it an official seal. 
The law required that leather should be ' sufficient in 
all points.' It was not, in the first place, to have 
been gashed or cut in the hide. Did any butcher, or 
other person, inflict such injury, m flaying any ox, 
bull, steer or cow, each gash cost him a twelvepence. 
The hide, in the next place, was not to be put into 
any oozes where it should ' take any unkinde heates,' 
under a penalty of twenty pounds. Woe to the tan- 
ner if he spoiled it by any ' evell workmanship or 
handleing' whatever — its forfeiture in this case was 
certain. The liquors of his vat were to be of the 
best quality and quantity. He was thoroughly to 
understand, and thoroughly to practice the whole 
' mistery or faculty of curreing.' It was the business 
of the Leather Sealer to see that he did — to ' search 
and view' his premises for this purpose — to submit 
his hides to skilful triers when doubt existed as to 
their goodness — to seize the bad ones for forfeiture — 



192 HARTFORD. 

to mark the good ones with all 'convenient speed' for 
sale and use — and putting into his pocket for his ser- 
vices " two pence per hide for every number under 
five" that he sealed, and "twelve pence for every 
dicker," or ten hides, he was to take care that " the 
severall members of the Commonwealth," to use the 
language of the old law, suffered no " abuses or in- 
conveniences" from the tanners of the day, or from 
their connecting links the butchers — in short, like the 
old Roman Dictator, was to see that the Republic re- 
ceived no detriment, as regards at least its under- 
standing. Another example this of that sumptuary 
legislation which we have heretofore had occasion to 
notice — mild however, very, in comparison with that, 
on the same subject, which filled the Statute Books 
of England, and oil of roses, as well as of good oak- 
bark, compared with the absurd and tyrannous Leath- 
er Laws of James the First. It may have been use- 
ful, perhaps, in its day, but, tried now, would probab- 
ly result in the ' tanning' of Leather Sealers, instead 
of the tanning of skins, and produce 'hidings' instead 
of hides. 

But to return. Custom Masters were to collect du- 
ties on wines, liquors, and some of the time on tobac- 
co brought into the Colony, till 1662, when all former 
orders imposing customs were repealed, and ' free 
trade' was established ' in all places in this Colony.' 
The first officer of this description in Hartford was, 
in 1659, Jonathan Gilbert — a leading man — a man 
who was extensively engaged in the trade and coast- 
ing business of the Town — whose warehouse figured 
at the Landing Place — and who was honored with 



ITS CIVIL HISTORY 



193 



the office of Marshal, or High Sheriff of the young 
Colony. Custodiers of the Meeting- House are suffi- 
ciently explained by their title. The duty of a Pack- 
er was to " pack and unpack all such meat as [was] 
sent forth of the Townes," and to mark each barrel 
with the letters C: R:* The Brander of Horses was 
an officer, it is implied from the Records, of much 
importance, since we find his marks, as well as the 
color and age of horses, in the case of all these ani- 
mals that were exported, were to be carefully record- 
ed by the Town Clerk, under a penalty of twenty 
pounds, and the Clerk was to receive sixpence for 
each entry. 

And now, Reader, in conclusion, let us pause a mo- 
ment over one town functionary whose official dignity 
expired in the Period upon which we dwell. We 
have not hitherto introduced him to the Public, as the 
entries respecting him, misplaced in the Records, are 
found mingled with the entries of the year 1663. 
Know him then now, Reader — the Chimney Sweeper 
of the Town ! What shall we say of him ? Noth- 
ing by way of describing his business — this is plain. 
But who was he? One of those "dim specks, poor 
blots, innocent blacknesses," of whom Elia speaks, 
" such as come forth with the dawn, or somewhat 
earlier, with their little professional notes sounding 
like the peep-peep of "a young sparrow?" Marry, no, 
he was not — though, but for the dignity of his ap- 
pointment, he might have been, for the sable sons of 
Ham were in our Town at the time of which we 

# Connecticut River — probably. 



194 HARTFORD. 

speak, as we shall have occasion to show hereafter, 
and doubtless, therefore, there were some petit Ham- 
ites, 'blooming through their first nigritude,' who 
were just fitted, of course, to ease chimneys of their 
overcharged secretions, so that fires might " curl up a 
lighter volume to the welkin." But the Sweep of 
Hartford was of the veritable Caucasian blood — he 
was white — a white citizen — and he was appointed 
first in 1639 — formally appointed. He was no worth- 
less accident — no mere vagrant creation of smoke 
and vapors — but a Town functionary, as we have en- 
titled him. His empire over chimneys was munici- 
pal. His sooty sovereignty was an extract from or- 
ganization, and his name was John Gunnings. Lank, 
lathy and lanceolated in shape, doubtless he was, to 
suit his vocation — a very 'chit' too, just fitted to en- 
ter the fauces averni, the fuliginous jaws of combus- 
tion's throats. Pursue him now in imagination, 
Reader, as Charles Lamb pursues his ' chit'-sweep in 
London, on where he goes sounding through the 
' dark, stifling caverns, horrid shades' of Hartford's 
first chimneys ! Shudder with the idea that " now, 
surely, he must be lost forever! Revive at hearing 
his feeble shout of discovered daylight — and then, oh, 
fulness of delight, run out of doors just in time to see 
the sable phenomenon emerge in safety, the brand- 
ished weapon of his art victorious like some flag 
waved over a conquered citadel ! " 

We'll leave you, Reader, looking at him and listen- 
ing, as did Elia, while from his little pulpit, the chim- 
ney top, in the nipping air of the morning, he "preach- 
es a lesson of patience to mankind!" Sc.eva. 



fartforlL 



ITS CIVIL HISTORY CONTINUED— PERIOD SECOND. 



No. 20. 



" What constitutes a State? 
Men, high-minded men." 



Jones 



"In all the [American] colonies, where the rule of partible inheritance 
prevailed, estates were soon parcelled out into moderate plantations and 
farms ; and the general equality of property introduced habits of industry 
and economy, the effects of which are still visible in their local customs, 
institutions and public policy." 

Judge Story. 

We have seen, in former Articles, that the policy of 
Hartford in regard to Inhabitants was watchful and 
highly conservative — that while the Town opened its 
arms to the good, the industrious, and the faithful, it 
refused to receive the idle, the dishonest, and the 
worthless, and at the same time shrank from embrac- 
ing those whose opinions were tainted with what it 
deemed adverse to the interests of church and state. 
It wanted ' men, high-minded men' to constitute its 
community — those with whom 

" Sovereign law, the State's collected will, 
Sits empress, crowning good, repressing ill." 

Its first policy, therefore, in regard to Inhabitants, was 



196 HARTFORD. 

steadfastly pursued during its Second Period — tri- 
umphantly as regards their formal admission by a 
vote of the people, for we find that during the whole 
time, so far as the Record shows, the Town extended 
this privilege to but eight persons. Its bounty in this 
respect was bestowed only upon Nathaniel hovering, 
Joseph Fitch, Nathaniel Kimberly, Jared Spencer, Tim- 
othy Nash, John Blackleach, Jr., Hervey Roe, and 
Robert Howard. But so far as new comers and mere 
residents are concerned, the efforts of the Town were 
not so successful as formerly in preventing the intro- 
duction of many that were exceptionable. True it 
now and then formally warned such to depart. True, 
now and then, it placed householders who entertained 
them under bonds to secure the Town against dam- 
ages from their residence in it. True, it at times 
prosecuted these bonds, as it did against Joseph Var- 
lett for ' his prejudicial and offensive carriage' in en- 
tertaining one Boltas and his wife, two Dutch strag- 
glers — compelling him to pay one hundred pounds or 
stand trial at the Court. True, now and then, it of- 
fered bounties to troublesome persons if they would 
remove from the Town, as it did, in 1664, ten pounds 
to "William Kelsey and his wife. Yet such cases of 
banishment, and of the enforcement of security, and 
of bounty for removal, were very rare — three or four 
only during the whole Period. 

The fact is, Hartford had already become a sort of 
El Dorado for emigrants, and at the same time a bee- 
hive from which new settlements took their rise. At- 
tracted by its beautiful location, by its fertility, its 
business, its good order, by its prospects generally, 



ITS CIVIL HISTORY CONTINUED. 197 

strangers sought it with eagerness, and many of these 
were not of the first rank as to character. They 
came in such numbers in 1659, and with such feeble 
commendation as to conduct, nay many of them 
with such positive disqualifications from their indo- 
lent or vicious habits, as to call for a new precaution- 
ary Town Act. Hartford wakes up suddenly at this 
time to the dangers from such persons, from their 
poverty, their evil manners, or their evil opinions. It 
pronounces the present prejudice and damage from 
this source to be great. It dreads the ill consequen- 
ces which in the future are ready to ' break in' — and 
goes on to forbid any one from entertaining or receiv- 
ing any family, person or persons who are not inhab- 
itants, and from renting to them any part of any 
dwelling, ' without consent by the orderly vote' of the 
Town, under penalty of five pounds a month for 
every violation of this order, and of liability for all 
just damages. What effect this prohibition had in 
checking fresh arrivals does not appear. Probably, 
however, it had some — yet not enough to alter the 
fact that, in its Second Period, Hartford received 
quite a numerous addition to its population of per- 
sons who, though not admitted inhabitants, were yet 
stated residents — many, doubtless, promising candi- 
dates for all the civic rights of freemen — some, doubt- 
less, prone to invade the good order of society — but 
all breathing the air, sharing the food, housed by the 
dwellings, subject to the laws, and participating in 
the movement of this primitive settlement on the 
banks of the Connecticut. 

Among the rest were, singularly enough — Jews. 



198 



HARTFORD, 



Yes, even here, in the shadow of the remote primeval 
wilderness of the New "World, and. in the company 
too of jealous Puritan emigrants, were some of the 
sons of Abraham. And they were Israelites who do 
not seem to have profited by the teachings either of 
Moses or the prophets — for one of them, David by 
name, distinguished himself by going into the houses 
of the Settlers, when the heads of the families were 
absent, and practising petty tricks of trade with the 
children in order to secure provisions, and for this and 
' such like misdemeanors,' was fined twenty shil- 
lings — and others, 1661, prohibited from gaining a 
settlement, were limited in their sojourn within the 
Town, in the house of John Marsh, to the period of 
seven months. 

Among persons too who lived in Hartford during 
the Period under consideration, as suggested in our 
last Article, were, singularly enough also — Negroes — 
so that, in view of the whole settlement, Noah's three 
sons, Shem, Ham, and Japhet, were all early repre- 
sented. An Act of the General Court, 1660, orders 
that " neither Indian nor Negar servants shall be re- 
quired to traine, watch or ward, in this Colony." 
Where did these Blacks come from ? Not from En- 
gland with the Settlers surely. Nor from the Dutch 
Colony in New York — this is not at all probable. 
But doubtless from the West Indies, brought in by 
some vessels trading from the region here with these 
Islands. Were they slaves ? We think they must 
have been. Slavery, we know, existed early and long 
in Connecticut, and has been but recently, as it were, 
abolished, but we did not expect to find the system 



ITS CIVIL HISTORY CONTINUED. 199 

begun so far back as it seems to have been. Yet 
there it was, doubtless, in the very infancy of our 
State. And negroes were treated well, we feel as- 
sured, though made cognizant, as were all servants, 
black or white, of the inferiority of their situation — 
for the Law, in set terms, in these times, compelled 
their services. They were to wait most ' industrious- 
ly' upon their masters. Without license from them, 
they were forbidden to ' give, sell or truck' any com- 
modity whatever, and if, being suspected of evil in- 
tentions, they ran away, men, and boats, and pinna- 
ces, might be pressed, at the public charge, to pursue 
them by sea and land, and bring them back ' by force 
of arms.' 

A proud people these Settlers were — the Leaders ! 
With all their true love for liberty, with all those 
blessings, 

"Those charms that dazzle and endear," 

which Freedom pictured here in the New World, 
they were socially a proud people, distinguishing after 
all the ' blood of the Howards' from all other, with a 
pride they were too fresh from the old country to for- 
get, and marking out ranks in their own community 
but too distinctly by their titles of address. Yet 
were those who thus 'felt their blood' unadulterate in 
their manners, and humane of purpose. They had 
none of the characteristics whatever of your modern 
parvenus — none. They were no rustics misfitted in 
silks, and misplaced in saloons. No flippant criti- 
cism with them on lower-class contact and plebe- 
ian coarseness — nor any lumbering attempt to worm 



200 HARTFORD. 

themselves into the favor of the well educated by 
talking, like Pope's Fribble, 

" in pretty phrase, 
Of genius, and of taste, of players and plays." 

They borrowed no adventitious graces from the ' al- 
mighty dollar!' They never, in pecuniary prosperity, 
forgot their humble acquaintances, nor deemed a poor 
relative ' a preposterous shadow,' or ' a death's head at 
the banquet.' No — nothing of all this characterized 
the pride of those whom we commemorate. It was, 
on the other hand, a pride of self-respect, founded on 
superior intelligence and manners, and mingled at the 
same time with a sense of birth and connections 
higher than fell to the lot of persons in general, and 
which the tone of opinion, in the days of which we 
speak, had not yet quite reduced to the modern demo- 
cratic platform. But let their ideas of social position 
have been what they may, it is true that, with them 
all, they never in their daily life and conduct forgot 
either civility or kindness. They never wittingly 
wounded a sensibility, impaired a right, or inflicted a 
wrong — for stretching over every person, pillared in 
the radical legislation of the Colony, aegis and sun to 
each soul that throbbed in our wilderness township, 
were the grand fundamental, constitutional provisions 
which guarantied the enjoyment of life, liberty and 
property — and in forming these provisions the leading 
Settlers themselves were the chief instruments. 

And see, in this connection, how not only those of 
whom we have just spoken particularly, but how all 
the Settlers took care of poor inhabitants. Towards 



ITS CIVIL HISTORY CONTINUED. 201 

these they always exercised a most commendable lib- 
erality. For these they always carefully provided. 
No sick or impotent person, no poverty-stricken 
'Goody Kelley and her child' ever went unfurnished 
by them with something to eat, and drink, and wear. 
Hartford had its Town-House, if not immediately, 
certainly within a few years after the founding of The 
Town. Its Selectmen, then as now, had the over- 
sight of paupers — could place them out to labor, and 
for support — were to give them, as now, when dead, 
'a decent burial' — in short, then as now, in the case 
of all who had not estate sufficient for then support, 
and no relations of sufficient ability who were obliged 
by law to sustain them, were to provide for them at 
the public expense. Blessed policy that thus, at the 
start of our Town, combined philanthropy and law in 
relief of those who ' sore pierced by wintry winds,' 

" shrink in the sordid hut 
Of cheerless poverty !" 

Let us take a brief view now of the policy of the 
Town in regard to lands and heritages during its Sec- 
ond Period. It was the same fundamentally with 
that described in a former Paper. It involved the 
same easy, republican principles of tenure, and the 
same facilities of acquisition, ownership, and aliena- 
tion. It continued to be free entirely from the restric- 
tions, from all the deadening weight of feudalism, 
and kept on nourishing that just pride of property, 
and that high sense of independence, which are the 
necessary concomitants of an allodial system, and the 

noble marks of freedom. Not content that the fea- 
26 



202 HARTFORD. 

tures of this policy should remain, as they were for 
fourteen years after the foundation of the Town, un- 
written, the Settlers of Hartford, with those of Wind- 
sor and Wethersfield, solemnly installed them in their 
Code of 1650, and there commanded, in terms which 
at once laid the axe to the root of possible oppression, 
that their lands and heritages should " be free from all 
fines and licenses upon alienations, and from all heri- 
ots, wardships, liveries, primer seisins, yeare, day and 
waste, escheats and forfeitures, upon the death of 
parents or ancestors, be they natural, unnatural, cas- 
ual or judicial, and that forever!" 

In its particular legislation with regard to lands, 
Hartford from time to time renewed its former orders, 
and kept a vigilant eye to their fulfillment. It still 
compelled the owners of home-lots, within twelve 
months to erect suitable buildings thereon, and " to 
maintain them sufficiently in a comely way." It 
still prevented the accumulation of many lots in the 
same hands. Still its Selectmen took charge of the 
common lands, and managed them as before, and 
let out the Indian ground in the South Meadow, from 
year to year, ' for the Town's use,' until, in 1663, with 
a liberality on the part of the Town which is praise- 
worthy, this ground was distributed to those native 
Indians of Hartford who had remained within the 
municipal limits. 

But the lands of Hartford alone, as we have hereto- 
fore had occasion to suggest, did not satisfy the Set- 
tlers. They were continually stretching out their 
hands for more, for the purpose of extending trade 



ITS CIVIL HISTORY CONTINUED. 203 

and settlement, or were receiving more, many of 
them, in reward for public services. And the General 
Court gratified their wishes and its own in this 
respect freely. It gave them many lands at various 
points 'within the liberties of Connecticut,' where 
the grants would not ' prejudice' any existing planta- 
tions — among others to Jeremiah Adams three hun- 
dred acres of upland and forty of meadow — to John 
Talcott and John Allyn jointly, six hundred acres of 
upland and one hundred of meadow — to Matthew 
Allyn, four hundred acres of upland and one hundred 
of meadow — to Jonathan Gilbert, three hundred of 
upland and fifty of meadow — to Governor Haynes, in 
addition to one thousand acres, about the Pequot 
country, granted him in 1643, three hundred acres 
more, in 1652, of meadow and upland ' for a farm' — 
to Joseph Haynes, two hundred and fifty acres of up- 
land and fifty of meadow — to Richard Lord, three 
hundred and fifty of upland and fifty of meadow — to 
Ensign Olmstead, three hundred of upland and forty 
of meadow — to Mrs. Stone and her son Samuel Stone, 
in lieu of a former grant to the husband and father, 
of a farm for " his good service to the country both in 
the Pequot War and since," five hundred acres of up- 
land and fifty or sixty of meadow — and to Samuel 
Wyllys, one hundred and fifty acres of upland, and 
fifty of meadow. How far these grants were im- 
proved does not particularly appear. That most of 
them were, however, is certain — and also that in this 
way the nuclei of new towns were fixed in various 
portions of the State. Hartford certainly was, in its 
very infancy, a remarkable bee-hive for new settle- 



204 HARTFORD. 

merits ! A little swarm here, one there, another there, 
and they clung, each, almost wherever in the region 
round about, a tree branch shaded the flowers of the 
wilderness. 

So one clung, 1645, at Titnxis, present Farming-ton. 
Thither went from Hartford, as chief settlers, John 
Steele, William Lewis, Stephen Hart, Thomas Judd, 
John Branson, John Warner, Nathaniel Kellogg, 
Thomas Barnes, Richard Seymour, and Thomas 
Gridley. Farmington — be mindful of the parent 
from whom you sprung ! You 

" Let the tender office long engage, 
To rock the cradle of reposing age!" 

So another swarm clung, 1650, at Norivalk. The 
first survey of this place was made by Richard Olm- 
sted of Hartford. He and his fellow-townsman Na- 
thaniel Ely first petitioned the General Court for 
its settlement — and succeeded. They, and Matthew 
Marvin, and Ralph Keeler, and Nathaniel Richards, 
all from Hartford, joined by a few families who pre- 
ceded them in purchasing, settled the town. Nor- 
walk — remember who started you on your career ! 

"No earth of thine is lost in vulgar mould!" 

So still another swarm clung, 1650 — at this date 
particularly, but some' of it before, and some just after 
our Second Period — at Mattabesett, now Middletown. 
One large portion of this place was first bought by 
Governor John Hay ties of Hartford, from Sowheag its 
primitive Sachem. The rest of it was first pur- 
chased, 1662, by Samuel Wyllys, likewise of Hartford, 



ITS CIVIL HISTORY CONTINUED. 



205 



from Sepunnemo and other Indian chiefs, and for the 
benefit of a band of Hartford planters, who chiefly 
settled the spot. Among these were John Hall, John 
Kirby, Alexander Bow, George Hubbard, Joseph 
Hubbard, Daniel Hubbard, Thomas Hubbard, Antho- 
ny Martin, John Savage, Samuel Stocking, Samuel 
White, Thomas "Wilcox, and John Wilcox. Middle- 
town — child of Hartford's loins — *we grew together, 
' like to a double cherry' — 

" twin, as 'twere, in love 
Inseparable, till within this hour, 
On a dissension of a doit," 

we fell out ! '■Air-line' at least your friendship then 
back again, if you please, to its parent home ! 

So still another swarm clung, 1659, not as hitherto 
within the domain of Connecticut, nor from the mo- 
tive merely of industrial enterprise — but in Massa- 
chusetts, and from the motive particularly of church 
quiet after an ecclesiastical difficulty which sorely di- 
vided the Town. It settled up the river at Hadley — 
the first there. Governor Webster and Elder Wil- 
liam Goodwin were its leaders, and following with 
them, were John Crow, Nathaniel Ward, John White, 
John Barnard, Andrew Bacon, William Lewis, Wil- 
liam Westwood, Richard Goodman, Wm. Partridge, 
Thomas Stanley, Samuel Porter, Richard Church, 
Francis Barnard, John' Marsh, Nathaniel Stanley, 
William Markum, Samuel Moody, Zachariah Field, 
and Andrew Warner — all from Hartford — besides per- 
haps one widow, whose illegible name leaves the 
place from which she emigrated in doubt. 



N 



206 HARTFORD. 

So still other emigrant bees left Hartford, not as in 
the cases already mentioned, in swarms, but singly, or 
a few only together — as Reinold Marvin, William 
Pratt, Zachariah Sanford, Jr., Robert Wade, and sev- 
eral others to Saybrook — Richard Webb to Stam- 
ford — John Mead, John Banks and others to Fair- 
field — Richard Lord, Thomas Stanton, Thomas Hun- 
gerfort, and a few others to New London, and to the 
Pequot country round about. 

But what made the Hartford Settlers, save in 
founding Hadley, swarm so? It is matter of sur- 
prise that with lands so fertile, extensive, and un- 
filled as those they possessed here, they, a mere 
handful comparatively, should so at once spread 
themselves! Was it restlessness, a desire for the 
"inlargement of the King's Dominions," a spirit of 
solitary proprietorship, thirst for acquisition, fondness 
for strange acquaintanceship, or what? But look 
at the spirit of emigration since ! See it convert- 
ing the Ohio and Missouri solitudes into civilized 
homes — while far beyond — threading the thousand 
devious arms of the Mississippi, and crossing the 
rugged declivities of the Rocky Mountains — the fear- 
less hunter, and trader, and emigrant, listen to the 
savage whoop on the banks of the Columbia, San 
Joaquin, and Sacramento, and found and rear insti- 
tutions and temples, to Liberty and to God, within 
sound of the breaking billow on the very shore of 
the Pacific! Everywhere, almost, behold the white 
sail ! Listen to the elastic steam ! Hear the tramp 
of the iron horse ! Like sons, like fathers ! 

Sc^VA. 



artforlL 



ITS MILLS. ITS INNS. PERIOD SECOND. 



No. 21. 

" Behold your mill," said Barbara — " it's as dark as the grave, and as silent 

as Glencairn Kirk." " Nay but woman," said the miller, rubbing his elbow 

and puckering his face like an ill-tied sack mouth, " will ye no be convinced ? 

D'ye no see that faint stream of light glimmering out at the door?" And he 

burst out singing, 

" Full merrily rings the millstone round, 

Full merrily rings the wheel — 

Full merrily gushes out the grist; 

Come taste my fragrant meal. 

Shout, fairies, shout ; see pouring out, 

The meal comes like a river — 

The top of the grain, on hill and plain, 

Is ours, and shall be ever!" 

The Elfin Miller. 



" Meet friendly, 
Drink moderately, 

Pay honestly, 
And part quietly. 



My liquors are good, 
My measures are just, 

Pay to-day, 
To-morrow I'll trust. 



Life's but a journey; live well on the road." 

From an Inn-sign at Northfield in Kent, England. 



They fed well — those Settlers — and better much, 
the mass of them, than the people of England of 
their day ! Not that they ever got the boiled capons, 
and curlew pies, and mutton jiggets, and roasted her- 
ons, and pheasant tarts, and fat nightingales seasoned 



208 HARTFORD. 

with pepper and ambergris, of the gourmands of the 
old country. Not that their chickens ever figured on 
their tables sitting upon artificial eggs of puff paste. 
Nor that, like Sir George Goring, they served up their 
pigs tied to bag puddings, and bitted and harnessed 
with cables of sausages, or like Oliver Cromwell, 
enclosed them in clay, " like an old Ironsides in his 
coat of mail," for a stewing in hot ashes. No — 
nothing of all this marked the fare of the Settlers. 
It was, on the other hand, simple — it was cooked 
without subtlety — it was substantial — it was, most 
of the time, in plenty. 

"Beef, mutton, and porke, shred pies of the best, 
Pig, veal, goose, and pigeons, and turkie well drest; 
Cheese, apples, and nuts, bear, chickens, and deere — 
These then in the countrie were counted good cheere." 

But more than all else in the way of aliment — seem- 
ing to pervade everything else, as air all bodies, or as 
blood the chambers of organization — was the Indian 
Corn. Oh the ways, the many ways, in which this 
■ filiform, pendulous, aboriginal Zea of botany was 
cooked ! Oh how sweet, how nutritious, how indis- 
pensable to the English appetite ! Oh, when malted, 
how vital its farina to beer, nay even to whiskey — 
and in medicine how many a good turn it served ! It 
was among the " dry nurses" of ancient Rome, it is 
said. It certainly dry-nursed the English Settlers on 
the banks of the Connecticut — and Ceres may well, 
for teaching its use, have gained her place among the 
gods. Really we can in no other way, than by then- 
fondness, as well as their necessity, at times pressing, 



ITS MILLS. ITS INNS. 209 

for Indian Corn particularly, and in its ground state, 
account for the ceaseless, anxious care with which 
the Founders of Hartford watched their mills ! 

Just see, Reader! Committees after committees, 
and sometimes the Selectmen, were appointed to look 
after these mills — now, and again, and again, to con- 
tract for building new ones — now to purchase, as of 
Mr. Cullick and Mr. Wyllys, one already built — now 
to repair one — now to see to the appropriation, as in 
one instance of two hundred pounds, for " further car- 
rying" one on — now generally to " order its affairs" — 
sometimes in connection with private owners — some- 
times exclusively " on the Town's account, for the 
Town's use," and with power to call out men " to do 
work" upon them. Judging from the incessant legis- 
lation of the Town on this matter, we should almost 
think that its " two women" were grinding at its mill, 
and that both were taken — that the genius of Italy 
had never introduced the water-mill — that like the 
Wadsworths who settled Geneseo, New York, the 
Settlers were compelled half the time, to reduce their 
corn into flour by the simple expedient of pounding 
in rough mortars cut in stumps of oak, with pestles 
as rough — or that, if they had millstones at all, like 
that to which Samson was condemned in his prison 
with the Philistines, they were turned by the, hand. 
Still a water-mill, one or more, for better, for worse, 
they did have, and soon one for sawing timber as 
well as one for grinding corn — the property of Wil- 
liam Goodwin — and the General Court allowed each 
miller, for grinding a bushel of corn, one twelfth part, 
27 ' 



210 HARTFORD. 

and for grinding a bushel of other grains one six- 
teenth part — and the Miller was to keep a Toll-Dish 
"of a just quart," and a Pottle- Dish of two quarts, 
and a Pint-Dish, all sealed, and an instrument to 
strike with, " all fit for the purpose !" 

The miller's toll! How the usage has descended ! 
But what a change in machinery since the days of 
which we speak ! And around how many busy mills 
in Connecticut now, cluster "the sheltered cot, the 
cultivated farm, the decent church," and stately trees, 

"with seats beneath the shade, 
For talking age and whispering lovers made," 

in ' sweet Auburns' of which the Hartford Settlers 
sowed the seeds ! 

And in these Auburns, homes for the weary travel- 
ler of course — Inns! Goldsmith, in his exquisite pic- 
ture of that 'loveliest village of the plain,' from which 
we have just quoted, has strangely forgotten these 
indispensable establishments — unless the ' house' of 
' nut-brown draughts,' the ale-house proper, was erst 
also the inn — which we doubt. It seems to have 
escaped him that ' health and plenty,' in houses for 
their peculiar entertainment, are to cheer the stranger 
and the wanderer as well as the ' village train.' Let 
us supply his omission, so far as regards the old 
Auburn of Hartford, Reader, and talk awhile about 
its inns ! 

At what time precisely, and where, the first was es- 
tablished, cannot be determined. It would be inter- 
esting to know — pleasant to shake hands with mine 
first host, and 'look to the guests within,' and like 



ITS MILLS. ITS INNS. 211 

Falstaff even, lay our ears " close to the ground, and 
list if we could hear the tread of travellers!" Pleas- 
ant to go into that inn's ' fat room,' and ' lend a 
hand' to laugh a little with its 'hearts of gold,' and 
for old time's sake, even take a cup of sack, for 
sack it had, and be ' merry as crickets !' But let us 
see if we can find the inn first. 

The earliest of which we have notice, was estab- 
lished in 1644, and curiously enough by express order 
of the General Court — and one not only in Hartford, 
but others in each town upon our River. Even at 
this early period there was quite an influx of persons 
from abroad into our settlements. " Whereas," says 
the General Court, " many strayngers and passengers 
that uppon occasion have recourse to these Townes, 
are streightened for want of entertainment, it is 
now Ordered, that the several Townes shall provide 
among themselves in each Towne, one sufficient in- 
habitant to keep an Ordinary, for provision and 
lodgcing in some comfortable manner, that such pas- 
sengers or strayngers may know where to resort ; and 
such inhabitants as by the several Townes shall be 
chosen for the said service, shall be presented to two 
Magistrates, that they may be judged meet for that 
employment, and this to be effected by the severall 
Townes within one month, under the penalty of 40s. 
a month, each month the Towne shall neglect it." 
So that the establishment of a tavern was, in its ear- 
liest day, made compulsory upon Hartford, and its 
citizens, as a body, voted for Boniface, and. two Mag- 
istrates reviewed their choice. We have the same 



212 HARTFORD. 

principle, though running through different channels, 
now. Our civil authority, selectmen, constables and 
grand jurors, are to nominate suitable persons for tav- 
erners, and the County Court is to grant them licen- 
ces. What important personages these landlords are! 
Alone almost, of all social laborers, directly embraced 
by the loving arms of the State — so two hundred and 
seven years ago — so now! Taverners of Hartford, 
does not the State compliment you? But come and 
let us introduce you, and our Readers generally, to 
your predecessor, the first and in his day the only tav- 
erner of Hartford — landlord Jeremy Adams ! 

He was a queer compound — this Adams — mis-be- 
haved and well-behaved. His follies, however, were 
confined to his youth — for it was as far back as 1644, 
when he was a comparative stripling, that he set on 
Thomas Hosmer to resist a constable in the levy of 
an execution, and received the formal censure of the 
Court for his " passionate, distempered speeches, and 
loud language, and unmannerly carriage" upon this 
occasion. He sobered down afterwards — became an 
active, useful citizen — and in 1663, was rewarded 
with the responsible trust of Custom-Master for our 
Town. The year previous, the General Court con- 
firmed him in his vocation as taverner. By special 
enactment it declared, that the house which he im- 
proved as an Ordinary should " remain in future for 
the same end and use" — be fitted to give sufficient 
entertainment both ' to neighbors and strangers' — and 
that Adams himself, though he should fail in some of 
the particulars of his agreement, should yet not for- 



ITS MILLS. ITS INNS. 213 

feit his license, but continue subject, at its discretion, 
to the censure of the Court. The monopoly also was 
given him of selling all wines under a quarter cask, 
and all liquors under an anker. His Inn was situated 
on Main Street, on its east side, and between the 
present dwellings of William Isham and Ezra Clark, 
Esquires. It stood back from the present line of the 
street about one hundred feet, and had a lot attached 
containing about three acres. The well which now 
supplies House number 121, Main Street, occupied 
by Miss Hepsibah Chenevard and others, is the same 
that supplied the house of Adams, and is directly in 
front of the location of the old Inn. That Inn too 
was the identical building in which, in 1687, the Gen- 
eral Court was assembled on occasion of the arrival 
of Governor Andross, when the brave Captain Wads- 
worth blew out the light, seized the Charter, and hid 
it triumphantly in the Oak. It was then kept, howev- 
er, by Zac-hariah Sanford, to whom Connecticut, hav- 
ing previously foreclosed a mortgage of the premises 
given to the Colony by Adams, had sold it. Poor 
Adams — he seems to have been in the latter part of 
his life unfortunate. He got into debt — badly — but 
quietly discharged his chief one, the debt of nature, 
in 1683, and slept then, undisturbed in that noiseless, 
subterranean inn, whose chambers echo to no living 
tread, and where the voices of all duns are hushed in 
the silence of the grave. 

But how, in the old time, was mine host to manage 
his inn ? No sooner had Hartford reached its Second 
Period, than his duties and responsibilities, were quite 
accurately denned by law. The mode of his appoint- 



214 HARTFORD. 

ment we have just seen. When established, he had 
his Sign. Not, of course, the ' White Hart,' or the 
' White Swan,' or the ' Blue Boar — heraldic these too 
forcibly of the Richards and the Henrys of the des- 
potic mother-land — but some 'Bunch of Grapes' — 
this is the earliest tavern carving of which we have 
notice, and appropriate as derived from our State 
Arms — perhaps some Hart browsing on the rich grass 
of our valley — or a chained lion — or an eagle repos- 
ing on his perch — or the head of an ox and a tankard 
of sack — or the General Wolfe of that day, John 
Mason the hero of the Pequot War. No matter — 
the landlord had his sign of some sort — it had been 
long in England a fixed custom. Jeremy Adams 
once neglected it, and the County Court, in 1679, or- 
dered him to set up a 'compleat one,' or pay a fine 
of forty shillings. The sign was necessary to lure 
the eye of the wayfarer to repose and to good cheer. 
And such cheer the host was bound by law to pro- 
vide. An Act of the General Court compelled him 
to entertain strangers 'in a comfortable manner. 5 He 
was to furnish ' every accommodation' necessary for 
this purpose — ' wine and liquors' as well as food, for 
the ' good refreshing both of man and beast.' In the 
language of writers on inns of that day, if a guest 
came to his house, he was not "to challenge a lordlie 
authority over him, but clean otherwise, since every 
man may use the inne as his owne house, and have, 
for monie, how great or how little varietic of vittles, 
and what other service, himselfe shall thinke expedi- 
ent to call for — and have cleane sheets to lie in, 



ITS MILLS. ITS INNS. 215 

wherein no man had been lodged since they came 
from the landresse — and have a servante to kindle his 
fire, and one to pnll off his boots and make them 
cleane — and have the hoste or hostess to visit him, 
and to eat with the hoste, or at a common table, if he 
pleases, or eat in his chamber, commanding what 
meate he will, according to his appetite, yea the 
kitchen being open to him to order the meate to be 
dressed as he liketh best." 

As for the horses of his guest, the landlord was to 
provide for them one or more enclosures for summer, 
and hay or provender for winter, with convenient sta- 
ble room and attendance — and this under a penalty of 
two shillings and sixpence for every day's default, and 
double damages to the party thereby wronged. 

He was not to suffer any persons to be intoxicated 
in his house, or to drink excessively. Half a pint of 
wine was all that he was allowed to deal out to one 
person at one time, nor was he to allow tippling to 
continue above the space of half an hour, nor at un- 
reasonable times, nor after nine of the clock at night.* 

* This was old landlord Moses Butler's hour, within the memory of persons 
now living, without other law than his own, for dispersing his guests. He 
kept tavern at the corner of present Main and Elm Streets, south of the 
Bridge. A "Seven Copper Club,' 1 '' so called from the expenditure of seven 
coppers by each member, every time they met, on half a mug of flip, and 
consisting of elderly gentlemen of the Town, used to convene at his house. 
He would never allow them to remain after nine, and to any solicitations for 
more liquor, after the customary half mug was consumed, invariably replied, 
" No, you shan't have another drop — go home to your families!" 

[The table of cherry wood used by this Club, together with two of their 
old. flip-mugs — quart mugs of pewter — are now in the possession of Screva. 
Curious relics indeed they are, that reach back, in their antiquity, even to 
the times of the Stamp Act! Ed.] 



216 



HARTFORD, 



He was not to deliver any wine out of his house, nor 
suffer any to be delivered, except upon a note from 
some master of a family and allowed inhabitant of 
the Town — and as for ' hot water' — which we take 
to mean the ' fire-water' ' cobblers,' or ' punches,' or 
' smashers' of modern times — these he was to sell to 
no one but in cases of necessity, and then in modera- 
tion.* Every person found drunk upon his premises 
was fined ten shillings. This was the fine for either 
moderate tipsiness, when but 

"A pleasing frenzy buoyed the lightened soul," 

or for that deeper intoxication in which 

" the feeble tongue, 
Unable to take up the cumbrous word, 



* What would the Hartford Settlers have thought of the following " Fancy 
Drinks" at twelve and a half cents each, which we copy from the present 
printed list of a famous Boston Restaurant? 



Plain Mint Julep. 


Tip and Ty. 


Spiced Punch. 


Fancy " 


Fiscal Agent. 


Epicure's Punch. 


Mixed " 


Veto. 


Porteree. 


Peach " 


I. 0. U. 


Split Ticket. 


Pine Apple " 


Tippe Na Pecco. 


Tom and Jerry. 


Claret " 


Moral Suasion. 


Milk Punch. 


Capped " 


Vox Populi. 


Peach Punch. 


Strawberry " 


Ne Plus Ultra. 


Cherry Punch. 


Arrack " 


Soda Punch. 


Jewett's Fancy. 


Race Horse " 


Shambro. 


Deacon. 


Sherry Cobbler. 


Pig and Whistle. 


Exchange. 


Rochelle " 


Citronella Jam. 


Stone Wall. 


Arrack " 


Egg Nog. 


Virginia Fancy. 


Peach " 


Sargent. 


Knickerbocker. 


Claret " 


Silver Top. 


Smasher. 


Ching Ching. 


Poor Man's Punch. 


Floater. 


Tog. 


Arrack Punch. 


Sifter. 


Ropee. 


Iced Punch. 


Soda Punch. 



ITS MILLS. ITS INNS. 217 

Lies quite dissolved, and confused above, 

Glasses and bottles, pipes and gazeteers, 
As if the table even itself was drunk, 
Lie a wet, broken scene."* 

What a bundle thus of good behavior mine host of 
the olden time, then almost the sole retailer of wines 
and spirituous liquors, had to be ! "What a burden of 
moral censorship he had to bear on his shoulders ! 
And he was to be ready, at all times, to give an 
account of his ' doings.' And he was peculiarly- 
responsible, then as now, for the safe custody of the 
property of his guests. The common law of En- 
gland, of force here as there, had long settled the 
principle that # if a traveller " lose aught whileth he 
abideth at an inne, the hoste is bounde by a general 
custome to restore the damage." Neither Pothier, 
Jones, Domat, or Story, have since laid down the 
law on this subject more clearly. 

But enough, Reader, for to-day. We have turned 
you out a grist from the old mills of Hartford. Just 
work it up, if you please, into the rolls of memory. 
We have taken you into Hartford's oldest inn, and 
introduced you to the landlord, and to his guests. 
Just talk with them, till you see us again ! Perhaps 



* Excessive drinking, in the times of which we speak, even though not be- 
wildering the sense, was punished by a fine of three shillings and fourpence — 
tippling above the space of half an hour, by a fine of two shillings and six- 
pence — tippling at unseasonable times, or alter nine at night, by a fine of 
five shillings — and double fines were exacted for second offences, treble for 
third, while imprisonment and sureties for good behavior followed upon the 
fourth, and justice laid on ten stripes where the. sot was unable to pay his 
fine, or clapped him unceremoniously in the stocks. 

28 



218 HARTFORD. 

they will tell you more than we have. They will, if 
you but open a little the wings of your imagination, 
and do not stand with them stupidly folded. Draw 
one of those large leather chairs, if you please — the 
landlord has two of them — * or one of his joint 
stools — near the fire — for it is chilly, and there's a 
merry blaze from those big logs ! Sit down now — 
cosily — and talk, and think ! The Room is over your 
head in which, a few years down, the Fathers of 
Connecticut pleaded for their old Charter! Hark 
how its floor resounds to the tread of Andross and 
his suite, and his armed myrmidons ! Listen to the 
retreating footfall of Wadsworth, as he glides, trophy 
in hand, into the open air ! Follow ' him out into 
the darkness ! Can you see him — hear him longer ? 
Pause then at the threshold, and poise that old oaken 
bucket on the curb of Jeremy's well, and incline ' its 
green, mossy brim' to your lips, and 'take a drink!' 
The patriots drank there ! 

By the bye, did your lips receive a salutation 
from that pretty hostess, or that pretty daughter, or 
that pretty maid, when you entered the Inn ? Such 
was the invariable custom in country inns in En- 
gland, down to the restoration of Charles the Sec- 
ond, and it was prized as an innocent embellish- 
ment. But sooth to say, we think you missed it 
here. Your Puritan landlord would never allow it. 
His scowl, at any attempt on the part of Ms house- 
hold thus to kiss a stranger, would have been enough 

* His inventory is preserved. 



ITS MILLS. ITS INNS. 219 

to turn the spiciest gale of Paphos into a bitter 
north-easter! The gallantries of the first half of 
the seventeenth century had taught him to look up- 
on love as a sort of ' chemical spirit that extracted 
all the folly and the flagitiousness of the age' — and 
a kiss was one of its adulterate voices. But just 
take your ease in your inn, Reader, till you hear 
again from Sc,eva. 



lartforlr* 



ITS ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY— PERIOD SECOND. 

No. 22. 

" For first of all when ye come together in the church, I hear that there 
be divisions among you." 1- Cor. xi. IS. 

"And there are differences of administration, but the same Lord." 

1. Cor. xii. 5. 

"Put on Charity, which is the bond of perfectness, and let the peace 
of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body." 

Col. Hi. 14, 15. 

Soon after the commencement of our Second Peri- 
od, a controversy commenced in the Church of Hart- 
ford which, " for its circumstances, its duration, and 
its obstinacy," says Trumbull, " was the most remark- 
able of any in its day — which affected all the church- 
es, and insinuated itself into the affairs of societies, 
towns and the whole commonwealth." Nor was it 
confined to Connecticut. It hung like a cloud over 
the heart of all New England — darkened almost ev- 
ery temple of worship, and kindled baleful fires at 
almost every altar. 

It began with a difference, between Rev. Mr. Stone 
and Elder Wm, Goodwin, either about the admission 
of some member to the church, or the administration 



222 HARTFORD. 

of the rite of baptism, and quickly involved many 
other points also of ecclesiastical polity. Look at 
the leading questions that were raised! 

What constitutes church membership — admission 
to full communion only, or a belief in Christianity 
and worshipful attendance upon its ordinances also ? 
Is the 'matter of the visible church' composed of 
saints exclusively, or of those also who, not being 
communicants, attend religious services, hold pews, 
and pay rates ? Particularly does it not belong to the 
whole body of a town jointly to call and settle its 
minister — and may not the adult seed of visible be- 
lievers, not cast out, be true members of the church, 
and subjects of church watch ? What constitutes 
baptism — is 'federal holiness or covenant interest' its 
proper ground ? Is the grace of perfect regeneration 
vital to its application, or may it not be used also as 
a seal of the covenant initiator// in its nature ? Par- 
ticularly is it scriptural to baptize the children of any 
parents who are not themselves in full communion ? 
Whence do ministers receive their commission to 
baptize ? Does the word of God warrant the com- 
munion of churches, as such ? Has a synod decisive 
power ? How far shall any particular church yield to 
its authority, or to that of any other ecclesiastical 
council ? Must every person, grieved at any church 
process or censure, acquiesce in it, and if not, where 
shall he repair ? What is the gospel way to gather 
and settle churches ? Does the laying on of hands in 
ordination belong to presbyters or brethren ? A for- 
midable list of questions truly ! But there were oth- 



ITS ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 223 

ers too — of minor consequence, yet all involved in 
these just stated — and most of these, in point of fact, 
in the two salient ones of church membership and 
baptism, of which baptism particularly was debated 
with an ardor that neither Socinian nor Romanist, 
Pelagian nor Hermian, not Nazianzen, St. Cyril, nor 
Salmasius, have ever surpassed. 

We are blameless, as most people, in our lives and 
conversation — we are well disposed — we are sober — 
argued, according to Mather, ' multitudes' of per- 
sons — and so particularly many of the church in 
Hartford. We are full believers in the doctrines of 
Christianity. We desire to accept Christ for our Re- 
deemer. We seek forgiveness of our sins. We are 
ready to promise that, through the aid of the Holy 
Spirit, we will forsake the vanities of this evil world, 
and strive to act according to the rules of the gospel. 
We wish to submit ourselves to the watch and disci- 
pline of the church. Particularly we will promise to 
bring up the children that may be given us, in the 
nurture and admonition of the Lord. We want the 
distinction and privileges, therefore, of church mem- 
bership for ourselves, and of baptism for our children. 
True, we are not communicants, but we will labor 
diligently to become so. Why then shut upon us, 
' hopeful candidates' as we thus are, the doors of 
church privilege ? Is it just ? Is it wise ? Why 
make no difference, in this respect, between ourselves 
and Pagans ? Why, in particular, exclude our off- 
spring, dear as they are to our hearts, and partakers, 
as it is our dearest wish they should be, of the king- 



224 HARTFORD. 

dom of heaven, why exclude them from the baptism 
of Christianity simply because our own honest doubts 
and fears are such that we cannot ourselves ' come 
up to the covenanting state of communicants at the 
table of the Lord?' This is harsh — it is an unwar- 
rantable strictness. Baptism and full communion are 
separate things, and the former, with church watch, 
may be enjoyed without the latter. Seal though it be 
of the covenant, baptism is after all but an initiatory 
rite. It does not of itself absolutely confer, it does 
not of itself indelibly impress the grace of regenera- 
tion, nor is salvation so inseparably annexed to it, as 
that without it no person can enter heaven. " The 
Lord hath not set up churches," be it remembered, 
" only that a few old Christians should keep one 
another warm while they live, and then carry away 
the church into the cold grave with them, when they 
die ; no, but that they might with all care, and with 
all the obligations and advantages to that care that 
may be, nurse up still successively another generation 
of subjects to our Lord, that may stand up in his 
kingdom when they are gone."* So pleaded, so de- 
manded one large party in the church of Hartford — 
and some of its members, going farther than others, 
claimed for all who professed the Christian religion 
and led honest lives, every rite and privilege of the 
church, without inquiry made as to any change of 
heart. 

On the other hand it was urged, in reply to these 
claims, that they were wholly inconsistent with the 

* Cotton Mather. 



ITS ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 225 

rights of the brotherhood and the strict principles of 
the Congregational churches — that they were innova- 
tions on its practice, and contrary to its purity — that 
they would subvert the very design for which the 
churches in New England were planted. Baptism, 
said the advocates of these views, is a seal of the 
whole covenant of grace — those, therefore, not inter- 
ested in this covenant by faith, by saving faith, by the 
being of repentance, ought not to have the seal there- 
of for themselves, nor for their children. If we ex- 
tend it in the manner demanded, there would be great 
corruption. It would be a profanation of the rite. It 
would have a natural tendency to harden unregener- 
ate persons in their sinful condition — and to admit 
such to privileges and membership in the churches, 
would at once throw the homes of the saints into the 
power of the worldly part of mankind, profane their 
administration, and pervert then efficacy. 

Thus armed, each with argument, each with copi- 
ous quotations from the Scriptures, from history, and 
from ecclesiastical writers and controversialists of 
every age, the two parties in the Church of Hartford 
went on, mingling as they progressed various new 
points of dispute — each bent on achieving a tri- 
umph — neither convincing the other — and each grow- 
ing daily more and more bitter, till the mischievous 
ecclesiastical tragedy was at last almost ready to 
burst in a fifth and closing act of religious desolation. 
What was to be done ? Councils of neighboring eld- 
ers and churches were called — in 1654 — in 1655 — to 
settle the dispute — and one from Massachusetts, in 
29 



226 HARTFORD. 

1656. No good resulted. Parties became more 
alienated than ever. The General Court, 1656, took 
the matter up, and appointed a committee to present 
the grievances to the General Courts of the United 
Colonies, for advice, for conciliation. A Council, ap- 
pointed by Connecticut and Massachusetts, was the 
result. It heard the grievances — debated them — gave 
answers to twenty-one of them, and to the principal 
ones, those regarding church-membership and bap- 
tism, replied in favor of a liberal extension of these 
privileges. Still the Church at Hartford was not sat- 
isfied. A number of its members were about with- 
drawing to the Church at Wethersfield. Mr. Stone 
applied to them the thunders of his Vatican — a 
course of discipline. It did no good. The Commis- 
sioners of the United Colonies wrote them. It did 
no good. The General Court again, 1658, interfered. 
By this time numbers of the Church had actually 
withdrawn. The Court attempted to reconcile them 
to their brethren, through the agency again of the 
elders of the Colony. Mr. Stone, defender, as he 
was, of the independent action of his Church in the 
case and of its power of discipline, gallantly offered 
to dispute with any person, in the presence of the 
General Assembly, the right of the aggrieved breth- 
ren to withdraw, and to prove their act ' a sin exceed- 
ing scandalous and sinful.' The Court declined the 
proffer, but again, 1659, called at Hartford another 
Council of the elders and churches of Boston, Cam- 
bridge, Charlestown, Ipswich, Dedham, and Sudbury, 
to heal the divisions. The Council convened — twice 



ITS ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 227 

during the year — and for the first time, good was now 
done. The salve applied began to heal the old sore. 
It brought the parties in Hartford much ' nearer than 
they had been before!' Other causes combined, 
about this time, to improve this state of things. 
Some of the persons who figured conspicuously in 
the controversy, had passed to the land of silence. 
" The dust of mortality," says Mather, was thrown 
upon them, " so that they not only left stinging one 
another, but hived with unjarring love in the land 
that flows with what is better than milk and honey." 
Other disputants removed from Hartford to other 
places — Mr. Cullick to Boston — Elder Goodwin and 
Governor Webster, with a number of others from 
Hartford, with Rev. Mr. Russel and about thirty oth- 
ers from Wethersfield, and with some from Windsor, 
went up the River, as has been heretofore stated, and 
founded Hadley in Massachusetts. Peace was once 
more comparatively restored. The acrimony of dis- 
pute, though not the dispute itself, ceased. Men, 
though disagreeing in opinions still, differed not so 
widely, nor so numerously as before, and differed with 
more composure. The dove, and not the kite, began 
to hover over their spirits — so that by November, 
1659, a Proclamation for a Thanksgiving recognized 
the settlement of the difficulties in our Town, partic- 
ularly through the agency of the latest Councils, as 
an event demanding public joy and praise. 

What now, it will naturally be asked, on reviewing 
the controversy we have described, what made these 
people of the olden time so warm, and withal so bit- 



228 HARTFORD. 

ter ? Prudent, good, forbearing persons that we sup- 
pose them to have been — not apt ' to let their angry- 
passions rise' — why in this matter so quarrelsome 
and so acrimonious ? 

Well, in the first place, such, as upon them, is the 
usual effect of all religious dispute. The Odium The- 
ologicum has grown into a proverb ! Religion lies so 
nearest the hearts of men that they find it more diffi- 
cult for this reason, we suppose, to endure differences 
of sentiment upon theological than upon other sub- 
jects — and anger and the pride of opinion, with the 
best of us, are after all the hardest passion-horses of 
our nature to bit and rein in. In the next place a 
new, and in some important respects a different gen- 
eration, as compared with the First Period of the 
Colony, had sprung up. Formerly there had been 
great harmony in the church. Though strictly Calvin- 
istic in doctrine, and rigid in its exaction of duties 
and in its discipline, it had no sectaries. Its clergy 
' walked in the most endeared friendship, like Moses 
and Aaron' with the Legislature. Its influence was 
rarely questioned, and almost unbounded. Now 
many of the old ministers were dead, as was particu- 
larly, Mr. Hooker. Quite a number had returned to 
England. The children of the First Period had be- 
come adults. The stamp of grand-father and grand- 
mother was upon most of their parents who survived. 
New emigrants had arrived, less strict in their views 
than those who preceded them. A new spirit was 
abroad — one in some material features more liberal, 
less submissive, more inquisitive, more progressive, 



ITS ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 229 

but at the same time, under some aspects, less scrip- 
tural, perhaps, and less pure. It would of course 
seek, as it did, increased freedom in the administra- 
tion of religion. Fewer comparatively were church 
communicants than formerly. Such, if of sober lives 
and conversation, would naturally strive, for them- 
selves and for the sake of their children, to relax the 
rigid claims of the church. Many there were also 
who began " notoriously to forget the errand into the 
wilderness" — many whom ' the enchantments of this 
world' led "sensibly to neglect the primitive designs 
and interests of religion as propounded by their fath- 
ers." All such would naturally look with indifference 
upon any struggle for the preservation of old ecclesi- 
astical opinions and usages, or labor earnestly after 
emancipation from their restraints. Others there 
were also, many as compared with former times, who 
were decided sinners — who neither sought the influ- 
ences nor cared for the duties of piety, but who, on 
the other hand, disrelished its ordinances and even 
despised its demands. All such would of course like 
a quarrel which tended to relax the strictness and 
weaken the force of Christian organization — would 
help it on — would relish the spectacle of religious 
parties pitted in the field of strife, 

" To prove their doctrine orthodox 
By apostolic blows and knocks — " 

would rejoice even to see each casting upon the 
other frowns, 

"as when two black clouds, 
With Heaven's artillery fraught, come rattling on 
Over the Caspian." 



230 HARTFORD. 

Under all the circumstances now described, it is 
not strange that the controversy upon which we have 
dwelt, assumed in Hartford the phase that it did. 
Reasoning doubtless from these circumstances, but in 
their nascent state — when like little clouds they were 
' no bigger than a man's hand ' — Mr. Stone, singularly 
enough, at the very beginning of the Second Period 
in our History, in a time of profound calm, foretold 
the controversy, and its violence. He foretold it de- 
liberately, and in a sermon preached in 1650. The 
churches, he said, will " come to be broken by schism, 
and sudden censures, and angry removes." Ere they 
are aware, he added, there will be in them " prayers 
against prayers, hearts against hearts, tears against 
tears, tongues against tongues, fasts against fasts, 
and horrible prejudices and underminings." How 
quick, alas, did his own Church become 'the stage 
of all these tragedies!' 

And now, Reader, in imitation of the Puritan 
preachers of the olden time, let us put the story we 
have told you — the historical sermon we have deliv- 
ered — to a few ' Uses? It was said of our own 
colonial Leader, Mr. Hooker, that he was ' the best 
at an Use' of any divine of his day — so skilful 
was he in this theological appliance, so close, so 
moving! "We will follow his example, briefly, in 
our own lay way. Attention, all ! 

The subject we have treated should teach us, in 
the first place, religious composure. Let us never 
make ' fretful porcupines' of our hearts in matters ec- 
clesiastical ! Stick these delicate organs with ' quills,' 
and fill them with gall, and point them with anger, 



ITS ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 231 

and you at once gangrene the substance of all true 
religious sensibility ! 

In the second place, we should exercise an enlarged 
Christian charity. Who cherishes no error? Who 
commits no mistake ? Prepare for him a Crystal 
Palace ! The world will gather to look upon him ! 

In the third place, we should practice religious Tol- 
eration. We don't all see alike. We don't all feel 
alike. We cannot. It was not intended that we 
should. Who made us to differ ? God ! The 
Almighty then is a Tolerationist ! Weak man, weak 
woman, ought you not to be so too ? 

Keep cool, be charitable, be tolerant — in all differ- 
ences of religious faith and practice, Keep Cool — Be 
charitable — Be tolerant ! These, Reader, are the 
Uses of our subject to-day. Are they not good ? 
Practised upon, will they not create and perpetuate 
religious harmony ? God's earth, be it remembered, 
is a sublime instrument, to be touched only lovingly 
by mortal fingers in his praise ! Strike it as if each 
key knew not, or hated the other, and you have a Ba- 
bel of sounds with which the harps of heaven have 
no sympathy — not one symphony in common. But 
touch it as if the love of sisters affiliated its chords, 
and it will respond in tones that will at once waft 
your soul's devotion to the skies, to join in the music 
of all the spheres, and mingle with the immortal har- 
mony of Paradise! Sceva. 



artfarL 



CODE OF 1650. PECULIAR LAWS. PUNISHMENTS. 
PERIOD SECOND. 

No. 23. 

" With a firm and skilful hand 
Mayest thou uphold the laws; and keep them ever 
Above the proud man's violence, and within 
The poor man's reach." 

Anon. 

"But as in tempest or winter one course and garment is convenient, in 
calm or warm weather a more liberal case or lighter garment both may and 
ought to be followed and used, so we have seen diverse straight and sore 
laws made in one parliament, (the time so requiring,) in a more calm and 
quiet reign of another prince by the like authority and parliament taken 
away." Statute 1. Edw. VI. c. 12- 

In May, 1650, a Code of Laws, the first in our his- 
tory, and the work of Roger Ludlow, emphatically 
the jurisprudent of his day, was concluded and estab- 
lished. In view of the age in which it was framed — 
in view, particularly, of the circumstances of the 
Connecticut Colony, its newness, its family character, 
and its earnest and at times feverish estimate of the 
ends and claims of religion, no Code was ever, upon 
the whole, more happily adapted to promote the inter- 
ests, and sustain the growth of fresh emigrants, gath- 
30 



234 HARTFORD. CODE OF 1650. 

ered in a new country to found a State. Much there 
is in it to us singular, to us utterly inapplicable — 
some things that actually force our laughter — but 
much at the same time that challenges our respect. 
When, at the very portico of this Code, we find it 
commanded, that no man's life shall be taken away — 
no man's honor or good name be stained — no man's 
person be arrested, restrained, banished, dismembered, 
or in any way punished — no man be deprived of his 
wife or children — no man's goods or estate be taken 
from him, or in any way endamaged, under color of 
law or countenance of authority — unless it be by the 
virtue or equity of some express Law of the Country 
warranting the same, and sufficiently published, or in 
case of the defect of a law in a particular case, by 
the Word of God — when we find, it is to be re- 
marked, such vital orders as these heralding the great 
body of statutes in the first Code of Connecticut — 
orders which look to the ' free fruition' of everything 
which " Humanity, Civility and Christianity call for, 
as due to every man in his place and proportion" — 
we cannot but concede that the ' Tranquility and 
Stability' of the Church and Commonwealth were 
objects nearest and nobly dear to the hearts of the 
Settlers. We must own that the spirit of true liberty 
directed their aims. We must bless their purpose, 
however in its execution they may, here and there, 
have marked their measures with oddity, or impressed 
them with harshness, or tinged them with folly. 

In all that regards the rights of persons and the 
rights of things, touching the acquisition, ownership, 



PECULIAR LAWS. PUNISHMENTS. 235 

enjoyment and alienation of property both real and 
personal, and redress for injuries to the same — touch- 
ing trade, agriculture and commerce — the Code is as 
ample as the times required. It guarantees to every 
man the free use and disposal of that which is his 
own, without ' injury or illegal diminution,' and reg- 
ulates and protects to every extent, then essential, 
the activities and the wants of industry and business. 
We do not propose now to dwell upon its provis- 
ions in these respects. We have had frequent oc- 
casions, in past Articles, to refer to and state them. 
But on some of its provisions in regard to private 
and public wrongs it is our purpose now to dwell, 
more or less as they are peculiar and reflect the 
spirit of the day. We want to know this spirit 
as it manifested itself in primitive Hartford. At 
another time we will look at sections of the Code 
as they bore on some of the domestic and private 
economical relations. 

Capital crimes then, in the first place, were more 
numerous with the Founders of our Town than with 
us. It was with them, as not with us, a capital of- 
fence to worship any other than the true God, or 
to blaspheme, or to commit adultery, or the crime 
against nature, or rape, or to practice witchcraft, or 
purposely to bear false witness, or to steal a man or a 
woman, or for children, unless brought up in ' un- 
christian negligence,' to curse or smite their parents, 
or be in their carriage stubborn and rebellious. De- 
rived these were all from the Mosaic Code — too rig- 
idly — unwisely — can hardly be doubted. Yet how 



236 



HARTFORD. CODE OF 1650. 



short the step here taken with the death-penalty com- 
pared with the enormous stride of boasted England! 
There, one hundred and sixty acts of frail man, down 
to the close of the eighteenth century, no less than 
one hundred and sixty acts declared by Parliament to 
be felonies without benefit of clergy, in other words 
to be worthy of instant death! What a dreadful 
list, and how moderate, how merciful, in contrast, is 
that which was in force here ! 

To the statute crimes now stated is to be added 
also, as peculiar, the sin of lying. This the Settlers 
could not bear in even its most ordinary forms. We 
punish it when it appears in the shape of entries, de- 
signedly false, upon the books of our corporations, or 
in pretences for obtaining goods, or in testimony, 
falsely given, with intent to take away life, or in ut- 
tering and passing as money any false tokens. But 
they deemed it in all cases pernicious. Early as 
1641 even, they stigmatized it, through their General 
Court, as a ' foule and grosse sin,' and made every 
person guilty of it liable to fine or bodily correction. 
And in their Code of 1650, they again solemnly de- 
nounce it, and specifying those lies particularly which 
are pernicious to the public weal, and those which re- 
dound to the injury of particular individuals, and 
those again which are employed " to deceive and 
abuse the people with false news or reportes," go on 
to punish all persons, above the age of fourteen, who 
are guilty of such lies, with fines, or with the stocks, 
or with stripes — and all children, under the age of 
discretion, who ' offend in lying,' are to receive, in the 



PECULIAR LAWS. PUNISHMENTS. 237 

presence of an officer, ' if any magistrate shall so ap- 
pointed due correction at the hands of their parents 
or masters. How the 'white lie' fared does not ex- 
actly appear. It was doubtless severely frowned up- 
on. Leniency of result even hardly saved it from 
castigation. But the common 'black lie' cost from 
ten to forty shillings, or from ten to forty stripes, or 
the stocks. How our public treasury would be re- 
plenished were such the law now ! Far be it from us 
to vilify, but we cannot help thinking that if each lie 
told every day, in our streets, and in our dwellings, 
were made tributary to the public fisc, our load of 
taxation would be sensibly lightened. Not that you 
lie, gentle Reader, or you, or you, or you, or we — God 
forefend — but that " other people do /" 

It was also a peculiar offence, in the Period of 
which we speak, not to attend church. It cost a man 
then five shillings to stay away — each time that he 
did. We rather think our Town Treasury would be 
somewhat replenished from this source too, were this 
old fine in force now. Don't you, Reader? There 
would be at least cash enough collected, we opine, to 
defray the cost of many of those expiatory fat tur- 
keys, and bovine ' Second- Cuts,' and South-Down 
quarters of mutton, and venison saddles, which on 
Christmas and Thanksgiving Days, absentees send, 
with loving compliments, to their pastor — thinking, 
alas, that the fire of his rebuke cannot stand before 
the superior fire of that " mighty artillery of sauces 
which the Cook-Fiend conjures up!" 'Mistaken 
souls, that dream of heaven ! ' But we would not be 
personal in this matter — no not we ! 



238 HARTFORD. CODE OF 1650. 

Let us look then at another singular law about re- 
ligion in the times of which we speak. A person 
guilty of contemning God's word or his messengers, 
was to be punished, for the first offence, by open 're- 
proof and bonds for good behavior — for the second, 
by a fine of five pounds, and by being compelled to 
stand publicly, upon a block or stool four feet high, 
upon a Lecture Day, with a paper fixed upon his 
breast containing, in capital letters, the words, an 

OPEN AND OBSTINATE CONTEMNER OF GOD's HOLY 

ordinances. How the defamer of his Maker must 
have looked thus labelled! Unwise the punishment! 
Public disgrace never yet turned erring man to God. 
Steep his sin in the dye of the world's despite, 
and you may blacken his sin, but will never whiten 
the sinner. 

All other offences than those we have now particu- 
larized, were such as are recognized and as are famil- 
iar at the present day. They were the ordinary of- 
fences against the public justice, peace, trade, health, 
and police or domestic economy of the Common- 
wealth. Turn we to look at punishments. 

There were, as now, the gallows, the jail, the work- 
house, fines, damages to parties injured, &c, but also 
the stocks, whipping, and the public censure of the 
General Court — penalties not now known to our law. 
Whipping was a very common resort — at the cart's 
tail — upon a Lecture Day — and to be performed by 
those who, having been publicly corrected for some 
misdemeanor, were liable at any time to be called out 
by the Governor, or by any Magistrate, to excoriate 



PECULIAR LAWS. PUNISHMENTS. 239 

offenders with the lash. They set the rogues to flog- 
ging the rogues. But this barbarous and worse than 
useless mode of punishment is, fortunately, in our 
day abandoned. We were ourself " in at the death" 
of one of the last whipping-posts in the State, when 
a boy at College. We remember the fact with satis- 
faction. It was in New Haven, now nearly a quarter 
of a century ago — one stormy, fierce night — mid- 
night — when the Authorities were all asleep. Down 
went then, with much difficulty, for it was old and 
harder much than the bare-backed sins it was in the 
habit of sustaining, down went that aceldamic sup- 
port for shrieks, and gushing blood, and for hearts 
which with each drop they lost grew more indurated 
in crime ! Down it went there where it stood by the 
side of the old Court House of the City, and nobody 
knew who did it but the four or five young College 
boys who were agents in the affair, and God, who 
looked through the darkness and the storm, and said, 
" Well done !" We can hear that voice even now, 
sounding through the depths of time its sublime tone 
of approbation! What should we do were the Au- 
thorities of New Haven to prosecute us, at the pres- 
ent time, upon this our public confession ? What 
plead in such a case ? Lapse of time ? No. Im- 
maturity, as a boy ? No. What then ? Human- 
ity — justice to the whipping-post itself — public opin- 
ion — the public weal ! Good defences all ! We 
think they would clear us. 

But to return. There was for burglary, or robbery 
in the field or highways, a peculiar penalty. For the 



240 HARTFORD. CODE OF 1650. 

first offence the criminal was to be branded with the 
letter B — for the second again branded and severely 
whipped. If he committed the offence on the Lord's 
day, one of his ears was to be cut off — if he repeated 
it on the same day, his other ear was to be cut off, 
and if a third time guilty he was to suffer death. 
Forgery was punished by the pillory for three days, 
the payment of double damages to the party injured, 
and by disqualification to act either as witness or 
juryman. Fornication was punished either by fine, 
whipping, or by a prohibition to marry, or by all three 
penalties combined. Small thefts were subject pretty 
much to the discretion of magistrates and courts. So 
was idleness, especially that of " common coasters,* 
unprofitable fowlers, and tobacco-takers." Profane 
swearing was followed by a fine of ten shillings, 
or by the stocks. In addition to the penalties now 
mentioned, civil disqualification was much more ex- 
tended than with us. It was applied to all persons 
either fined or whipped for any scandalous offence. 
Such were to have no vote either in Town or Com- 
monwealth "until the Court [should] manifest their 
satisfaction." 

"With regard to places of punishment. There was 
first a House of Correction, which was ordered in 
1640, and, in 1649, was kept by William Rescew at a 
salary of ten pounds a year. There was a Prison- 
House — spoken of first in 1652, though doubtless one 
of some sort existed before. A new one was built, 

* Loafers, we suppose — in modern parlance. 



PECULIAR LAWS. PUNISHMENTS. 241 

however, in the year just mentioned, and Daniel Gar- 
rit was its first jailor. It was enlarged in 1664. 
There was also a Town-House, for the first time spo- 
ken of near the close of 1658. These buildings, 
though the first two belonged to the Colony, were all 
located in Hartford — the Prison probably near the 
south-west corner of present State and Market streets. 
What were its regulations ? Here History is silent. 
We should like to know its system of discipline. 
It might perhaps, in some respects, teach us moderns 
a lesson. 

And now, Reader, in conclusion, we think we may 
with justice say that our ancestors had many very 
exact notions both as to the nature, and ends, and the 
measure of punishment — notions which were in the 
main conformable to those which now prevail. With 
them, as with us, crimes were such either by force of 
intrinsic turpitude, or of legislative prohibition, and 
those of the latter class, however they may appear 
now, were as truly a reflex of the spirit of the day, 
and as justly the offspring of local exigencies and 
supposed public necessity, as are those of our own 
time. There was not a particle of the lex talionis 
in their system — no eye for an eye, or tooth for a 
tooth. In regard to sanguinary punishments they 
were Porcians indeed in comparison with England — 
for they abrogated at once, with mercy and with 
judgment, the more than twelve, nay the more than 
one hundred bloody Tables of their father-land. To 
prevent crime by reforming offenders, by depriving 

them of the power to do future mischief, and by 
31 



242 HARTFORD. 

deterring others through the dread of their examples, 
such was the object of their criminal code, and 
such is the true object of every enlightened modern 
code. In this respect certainly the Settlers of Hart- 
ford, in common with those of sister towns in the 
Colony, were not behind our own times. 

SCJEYA. 



fartforir. 



DUTCHPOINT. ITS HISTORY. PERIODS 
FIRST AND SECOND. 

No. 24. 

" The veteran Oothout, at a concerted signal, stepped forth in the assem- 
bly [at Hartford] with the identical tarpauling spy-glass in his hand, with 
which he had discovered the mouth of the Connecticut, while the worthy 
Dutch Commissioners lolled back in their chairs, secretly chuckling at the 
idea of having for once got the weather-gage of the Yankees; but what was 
their dismay when the latter produced a Nantucket whaler with a spy-glass, 
twice as long, with which he discovered the whole coast, quite down to the 
Manhattoes; and so crooked that he had spied with it up the whole course of 
the Connecticut River. Therefore, the Yankees had a right to the whole 
country bordering on the Sound; nay, the city of New Amsterdam was a 
mere Dutch squatting place on their territories." 

Knickerbocker's Keio York. 

It is 1614 — thereabouts — and up the Connecticut 
River — stemming one of the most placid and majes- 
tic currents of the New World — mirrored in a glassy 
bosom that never before reflected aught save the 
canoe of the Indian — a little yacht of sixteen tons 
comes threading the long watery channel of a dense 
wilderness. It is a Dutch vessel, the Onrust, or Rest- 
less, commanded either by Adriaen Block or by Skip- 
per Cornells Hendricxsen, or by both together, the one 
as captain, the other as mate — and it is on a voyage 



244 HARTFORD. 

of discovery.* It reaches the present site of Hart- 
ford. It passes a little beyond — near to the Falls. 
The skipper is busy the while noting each remarkable 
appearance around him, and rudely mapping contours 
of hill, and dale, and stream, and outlines of forest, 
and groups of wigwams. The yacht descends to the 
sea. It returns to New Amsterdam. It has borne 
the first white crew up and down the Fresh River ! 
The Dutch claim Connecticut ! 

Not so fast, men of old Batavia, exclaimed the sons 
of Albion — Stop! John Cabot and Sebastian Cabot, 
in 1495 and 1497, by order of Henry the Seventh of 
England, sailed along the coast of this continent — 
the one a part, the other the whole of its extent — 
from the fifty-sixth ■ to the thirty-eighth degree of 
north latitude, and explored it. The royal order com- 
manded them to take possession of the new countries 
they should discover — in the name of the King. 
They did so. By virtue then of commissions from 
the British throne, by force of priority of discov- 
ery — that acknowledged principle of European polity 
which regulated the exercise of the rights of sover- 

* We cannot determine positively which commanded — Block or Hendricx- 
sen. Most accounts represent Block as master. But the Map of the country 
made at this time, and presented to the States General of Holland, is in the 
name of Hendricxsen. We have seen it stated also that Hendricxsen accom- 
panied Block as his lieutenant or mate. It is a singular and interesting fact 
with regard to the yacht employed, that she was built in New York, and was 
the first vessel, of which we have any account, that was built in that port. 
Her name, the Restless, is prophetic enough for that " restless metropolis, 
whose enterprising commerce now pushes its wharves into the sea, blocks up 
the wide rivers with its fleets, and sending its ships, the pride of naval archi- 
tecture, to every clime, defies every wind, outrides every tempest, and in- 
vades every zone." 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 245 

eignty and settlement in all the cis- Atlantic Planta- 
tions — the whole vast region from Labrador to the 
Gulf of Mexico belongs to the British crown. By 
the title of prior discovery Spain holds, unquestioned, 
all her possessions in the New World. By this 
France claims Canada and Acadie. By this Portu- 
gal maintains her right to the Brazils. And by this 
even you Dutchmen yourselves challenge ownership 
of the whole territory on the Hudson river. We 
refuse then your claim, Adriaen or Cornells, to the 
region here — that of each or both of you, and that 
of New Amsterdam, and that of the High and 
Mighty« States General, your master! We deny the 
title of you all to an inch of soil yet within the do- 
main of Connecticut! 

It is 1633 — October — and again up the fair, the 
glorious Connecticut, winds another small vessel, of 
name to us unknown, and nameless in history the 
souls she bears. But she is another Dutch yacht. She 
has a Dutch commander. She has a Dutch crew. 
She is from a Dutch colony. She is loaded with 
Dutch bricks, with implements for building, with am- 
munition and with arms. Down go her sails, furled 
just where our Little River empties into its mighty 
sister. Up — close adjoining on the south — goes 
quickly a small compact fort. It is baptized the 
House of Hope. It is on land bought the eighth of 
June that has just preceded, from Pequot Sachem 
Nepaquash, by Jacob Van Curter, by order of Worter 
Van Twiller, Governor of New Amsterdam. The 
Dutch flag floats from its ramparts. Dutch cannon 



246 



HARTFORD. 



bristle through its embrasures. The Dutch claim the 
lands of our present township — and many more ad- 
joining — by possession and by purchase! 

Stop again, Belgic adventurers, exclaimed the sons 
of Albion ! The broad seal of England is upon all 
America, which, between the fortieth and forty-eighth 
degrees of north latitude, stretches a continent across 
1 from sea to sea.' James of England placed it there 
thirteen years before you thought of settling on the 
banks of the Connecticut — and made a special grant 
of this region to forty Englishmen — and he baptized 
his gift New England in America, and ordained that 
by this name it should have " continuance forever." 
Sub-grants — and before too a single brick of your fort 
was laid — bestow Connecticut particularly upon elev- 
en Englishmen, noblemen, knights and gentlemen, to 
whom alone, or to whose heirs or assigns, the right to 
extinguish the Indian title to its soil belongs. Pray 
have you never heard of the great Council of Ply- 
mouth in the County of Devon, established " for the 
planting, ruling and governing" of this land, nor of 
Robert Earl of Warwick, nor of the Connecticut Pa- 
tent of 1631 ? Pray have you forgotten that nineteen 
years before you came here to settle — when a Vir- 
ginia squadron paused before your establishment at 
the Manhadoes — you yourselves, as intruders on Brit- 
ish territory, obeyed Captain Argal's summons of sur- 
render, and stipulated allegiance to England, and trib- 
ute and subordination to the government of Virginia? 
Vassals to the British Crown, by your own confes- 
sion, in your own home upon the Hudson river, what 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 247 

right have you to sovereignty upon the Connecticut ? 
We disown your power, uncommissioned by English 
authority, to purchase from the sons of the forest one 
foot of soil on the banks of this river. We deny 
your right, without English permission, to possess 
a single rood of English land. Your House of 
Hope is built on sand. You are intruders! You 
are squatters ! 

Reader, in the view just given, we delineate, in its 
exact shape, the bone of contention between the En- 
glish and the Dutch at Hartford. Each claimed trade 
and settlement here by virtue of prior discovery, and 
to this claim the Dutch added those also of prior pur- 
chase and possession. The contest lasted with more 
or less of vehemence, though with occasional pauses, 
and tinged more or less with bitterness, down through 
a period of twenty years, till it finally closed in the 
total reduction of Dutch sovereignty within our town- 
ship and our State. 

The first month of Dutch settlement was yet warm, 
when a collision between the opposing parties oc- 
curred. William Holmes of Plymouth Colony, a res- 
olute, enterprising man — with a crew of resolute 
men — with the frame of a house, and boards, and 
nails, and all the materials requisite for its immediate 
erection, and with a commission from the Governor 
of Plymouth in his pocket, came sailing up the river, 
in a large new bark, in the latter part of October, 
1633, sternly resolved on effecting a settlement, for 
trading purposes, on the banks of the Connecticut. 
He was instantly hailed as he approached the Dutch 
fort in Hartford. " What do you intend, and where 



248 



HARTFORD. 



would you go," inquired emphatically Jacob Van 
Curter, the Dutch commissary then in command. 
" Up the river to trade," answered Holmes. " Strike 
and stay," shouted the Dutchmen, " or we will 
shoot" — and they stood by their two pieces of ord- 
nance ready to fire. " We have a commission from 
the Governor of Plymouth," replied Holmes undaunt- 
edly, " to go up the river. Shoot or not, we must 
obey our order, and we will ! We are not here to 
molest you, but we will go on !" And on the bark 
passed — and the Dutch did not fire. They doubtless 
feared the force of Holmes. It might have been su- 
perior to their own. They therefore contented them- 
selves for the present with a warlike protest — to 
which Holmes at once replied — and with instantly 
dispatching a messenger with the news to the Gov- 
ernor of New Amsterdam. The Dutch Governor was 
not long in making answer. Hardly had Holmes 
time, at the mouth of the Tunxis river in Windsor, to 
set up his house — the first probably ever built in Con- 
necticut — and fortify it with palisades, and gather 
within it his chosen company of men, and send his 
bark back to Plymouth, when a band of seventy 
Dutch, consisting of those in the fort at Hartford and 
of recruits from the Manhadoes, armed in full and 
with banners displayed, appeared before his new hab- 
itation, apparently bent upon its assault. Its defend- 
ers, though far inferior in numbers, were ready to re- 
ceive them. Full of spirit, full of hope, they -present- 
ed a daring front to the foe. The Dutch — did they 
quail before the heroism of this handful of English- 
men ? No matter. They at all events took counsel 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 249 

of their wisdom. They parleyed. They were assured 
by Holmes that he had not taken a foot of land which 
they had bought — that he had come to a place above 
them — and that having purchased the tract which he 
then held of its native proprietors — some of whom, 
Attawanott and others, Sachems of the place, he had 
brought home with him in his bark — he should under 
no consideration yield to their claims, but maintain 
the foothold he had got to the last extremity. The 
Dutch retired, and never again, that we can find, men- 
aced the Trading House at Windsor. 

Nor do we find the least symptom of any successful 
opposition in Hartford to those few white settlers 
from the old Bay State who preceded Mr. Hooker's 
Grand Party, nor any to that Grand Party itself. 
Clear it is, whatever may have been their protests — 
and that these were numerous we have no doubt — 
the Dutch did not again resort to armed force in order 
to prevent English colonization here. Clear it is, that 
within four years after the arrival of Hooker's Party, 
all the Dutch possessions within our township were 
narrowed down to a small tract of about twenty-four 
and a half acres on the south side of Little River 
near its mouth — to a much smaller tract of about 
three acres on the north side of the same river, form- 
ing nearly what is now known as Dutch Point — and 
to an island of about two acres which lay opposite 
the House of Hope on the east side of the Great 
River — and all this property, be it remarked, was held 
only by the tenure of English sufferance. 

A curious, though brief picture of Hartford and 
32 



250 HARTFORD. 

the Dutch, at this very period, 1639, is given in the 
pages of David Pieterszen de Vries, a Dutchman, 
who was Master of Artillery in the service of Hol- 
land, a famous voyager, and busy for a long period 
of his life in planting colonies. He sailed up the 
Connecticut to Hartford in the year of which we 
speak, and the extract we give is from his own 
Journal kept at this time. It is really a gem in 
its way, and cannot fail, we are confident, to interest 
the Reader. It is as follows : 

"In the morning of the 7th [June,] we came opposite de Versche 
Riviere [the Connecticut.] We went up the river, and on the 9th 
arrived with my yacht at the fort het huys de Hoop, where we found 
one Gysbert; Van Dyck as commander, with 14 or 15 soldiers. This 
fort is situated near the river on a small creek, forming there a fall. 
The English had also begun to build there a town (Hartford) against 
our will, and had already a fine church and more than a hundred 
houses erected. The commander gave me orders to protest against 
their proceedings. He added that some of his soldiers had prohibited 
them to put a plough into the ground, as it was our land that we had 
bought of the Indians and paid for; but they opposed them and had 
given a drubbing to the soldiers. When I came to the settlement, the 
English governor invited me to dinner. I told him during dinner, 
that he had acted very improperly in taking the lands of the compa- 
ny, which were bought and paid for by them. He answered me that 
these lands were lying uncultivated ; that we had been already here 
several years, and nothing was done to improve the ground ; that it 
was a sin to leave so valuable lands uncultivated, such fine crops 
could be raised upon them ; that they had already built three towns 
on this river, in which was abundance of salmon, &c. The English 
here live soberly. They drink only three times every meed, and those 
that become drunk are whipped on a pole, as the thieves are in 
Holland." 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 251 

A quaint, marked, pleasing, though somewhat 
'Dutchified' picture — is it not, Reader? And bring- 
ing Hartford, in some of its aspects, two hundred and 
fourteen years ago, rather vividly before the mind ! 
And important too for all its facts ! Here we have 
the name of the commander of the Dutch fort — Gys- 
bert Van Dyck — and the number of soldiers who 
manned it — fourteen or fifteen — truly not a very for- 
midable force. Then we have a "fine church" be- 
longing to the English Settlers. "Fine" — this is 
much for an experienced observer, like de Vries, 
to say of the first temple of worship in a wilderness 
town ! Then we have nearly the number of houses 
already erected in Hartford — " more than an hun- 
dred." There was an English population then here, 
probably, of some four or five hundred. Therr ,we 
have the persevering Dutchmen gliding out from their 
House of Hope into the fields where the English- 
men are at work, and protesting against them and 
their ploughs — and receiving for their pains — a ' drub- 
bing P We have no doubt it was a sound one. 
' Breath'st thou,' might have exclaimed with empha- 
sis the Englishman to the Dutch remonstrant, if 
Milton had only happened to have written his Par- 
adise Lost at this time — 

" Breath'st thou defiance here and scorn 
Where I reign King? Back [with] thy punishment, 
And to thy speed add wings !" 

Then we have de Vries taking a comfortable dinner 
with Governor John Haynes, and with Mrs. Haynes 
and the children, in his mansion at the corner of pres- 



252 HARTFORD. 

ent Arch and Front streets — and telling the Govern- 
or — we suppose politely — that he and his party had 
no business here — and the Governor courteously re- 
plying that they had. But oh David Pieterszen de 
Vries, we fear that you do not report all that good, 
learned, sagacious John Haynes told you. He doubt- 
less said it was a ' sin' to have lands so ' valuable' as 
those of Hartford unimproved — as your countrymen 
had left them — but we will wager the most valuable 
curiosity in our Sanctum — our Egyptian Ibis, for in- 
stance, which is worth its weight in gold — that he 
also told you of the Cabots, and the Broad Seal of 
England, and the Council of Plymouth, and the Pat- 
ent of Connecticut, and sent you home to report to 
your prompter at the Fort that it was best for him, 
and his countrymen, to "pull up stakes," and be off! 

But if he did, Reader, the Dutch were not yet 
ready to obey his advice — and did not. They stuck 
to their claims with proverbial pertinacity — and so to 
their own did the Hartford Settlers. An earnest cor- 
respondence ensued between the parties — voluminous 
enough certainly on the part of the English — but 
really on the part of the Dutch so incessantly fulmi- 
nated — " letter after letter, protest after protest, bad 
Latin, worse English, and hideous Low Dutch," as to 
give more the air of truth than of travesty to Died- 
rich Knickerbocker's description of the ' choleric little 
governor' Kieft as wearing out, by constant cam- 
paigning, " the four and twenty letters of the alpha- 
bet, which formed his standing army." Some of this 
correspondence remains — that especially between the 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY 



253 



Commissioners of the United Colonies of New En- 
gland and the Dutch officials. It reveals the daily- 
collisions, many of them with particularity, between 
the parties here in Hartford. We digest an account 
of some of them, and of some complaints also, as 
made on both sides, that our Readers may look down 
on the Point, and around our Town, and see the old 
quarrel nearly as it was — " going on." The picture 
will be found entertaining. Let us look then first at 
the side of the English. They complain — in the 
years 1646, 1650, and 1653 — as follows : 

1. That an Indian captive, who was liable to public 
punishment, fled from her master in Hartford to the 
House of Hope, and was there entertained — that 
though demanded by a Magistrate, the Dutch agent 
refused to give her up — and that she was either mar- 
ried to one of his men, or by some one of them 
abused — that such treatment as this of a servant, who 
was " part of her master's estate, and a more consid- 
erable part than a beast," endangered the security of 
the children of Hartford — that the Dutch agent him- 
self, upon a certain occasion, in the height of disorder 
and in contempt of authority, did resist the watch of 
the Town, and draw and break his rapier upon their 
weapons and escape by flight — and that upon another 
occasion the same agent, with four of his men, did 
forcibly seize some of the Dutch horses that had been 
impounded for doing damage to the English corn, 
and in seizing them did assault and strike an En- 
glishman " who legally sought justice, and did in an 
hostile way take away his team and lading." 



254 HARTFORD. 

2. That the Dutch at the Fort were in the habit of 
entertaining English fugitives also, of persuading 
them to run away from their masters, and of assisting 
them to file off their irons and escape when impris- 
oned — that in the instance particularly of one notori- 
ous delinquent, who was imprisoned at Hartford for a 
capital offence, a negro belonging to the Dutch aided 
him to break prison and escape, and was not called to 
account by his masters for this insufferable injury — 
that the Dutch purchased stolen goods, and would not 
give them up after demand made and satisfaction of- 
fered — that they refused also to pay for goods which 
their public agents in Hartford had taken up — and 
that they married English couples whose marriage 
had been refused in the English Plantations. 

3. That in addition to the injuries already stated, 
and others of the like nature, the Dutch at Hartford, 
particularly David Provost the agent there, were in 
the habit of putting their cattle in the cornfields of 
the English — that they opposed the erection of parti- 
tion fences between themselves and the English, and 
cut them down — that they disturbed the English 
when they were " plowing, sowing and reaping their 
ground and corn" — that several times provoking af- 
fronts of this character were given, and the Dutch 
had grown " to a high and insufferable boldness." 

Let us look now at the Dutch side of the picture of 
dissension. In a document entitled "A short Abstract 
out of the Register, and record of Passages betwixt 
the New Netherlands and the English nation," &c, to 
the ' eastward] signed by Governor Peter Stuyvesant, 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 255 

and by Carle Van Brigge as Secretary, and bearing 
date the twenty-sixth of May, 1653, the Dutch com- 
plain as follows : 

1. That April 25th, 1640, the English in Hartford 
not only prevented the Dutch there from sowing lands 
which the latter had purchased and broken up, but 
themselves sowed these lands with corn — that they 
beat the servants of the honored Company when they 
were laboring in their masters' fields, and drove them 
off with sticks and plow-staves, ' in hostile manner 
laming' — and that in particular, among the rest, they 
" struck Ever Duckings a hole in his head, with a 
stick, so that the blood ran down, very strongly down 
upon his body." 

2. That April 25th, 1640, the Constable of Hart- 
ford came upon the Dutch land, with ten armed 
men, when the Dutch were plowing, and smote their 
horses with sticks so that the latter were frightened 
and broke their ' geares in sunder' — and that not- 
withstanding a formal protest made to Mr. Hopkins, 
then Governor, the English continued to hinder them 
in the possession and cultivation of their land, " yea 
with blows and strokes even to the shedding blood, 
as can be justified." 

3. That May 30th, 1640, one of the Dutch horses 
was taken away from the 'vlacts' of Siagock, where he 
was pasturing, by the servant of Governor Hopkins, 
upon pretence that he had eaten their grass — when in 
fact he had not. 

4. That June 21st, the English of Hartford took 
away a cow and calf belonging to the Dutch, which 



256 HARTFORD. 

were pasturing upon the 'way vlact,' and brought 
them into the English village. 

5. That June 28th, an English minister took hay 
which the Dutch had cut and made on their own 
land, and applied it to his own use without giving 
any recompense. 

6. That at various times during 1641, 1642, and 
1643, the English renewed their attacks upon the 
Dutch while the latter were cultivating their own 
lands, beating and maiming the plowmen and horses, 
cutting the strings of their plows, and in one in- 
stance throwing plow, gearing and all into the river. 

7. That upon various occasions they drove away 
and sold the horses, cattle and hogs of the Dutch — 
now a single hog — now another — now five yearling 
hogs — now all the horses — now all the cattle — driving 
them away into the village pound from the Common, 
or vlact Sicajocka, to the great affront and insupport- 
able injury of the 'high and mighty' Dutch Company. 

8. That the English set posts and rails, and thwart- 
ed the way from the Dutch Fort to their woodland, 
and denied them the use of the wood. 

9. That the English asserting jurisdiction even 
within the House of Hope, did plow the lands close 
up to the Fort. 

10. That they even prevented the Dutch from driv- 
ing their own cattle to the New Netherlands. 

But enough, Reader, has now been presented to 
give you an insight, quite exact, into the old daily 
dissensions between the English and the Dutch at 
Hartford. The picture on both sides is the more in- 
teresting — we trust you have found it so — from its 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 257 

particularity. You see the parties in actual collision — 
in forcible collision. The drubbing- of which de Vries 
has spoken you find to have been in fact a sound 
one — nay more, carried far beyond moderation. You 
know what the contestants did. You can easily im- 
agine what they said. Their warfare was emphati- 
cally a border one — and it was obstinate, pervaded on 
both sides with a valorous hate, and though painful, 
was yet in portions of its display, it must be conced- 
ed, certainly amusing. Those assaults we have de- 
scribed, with their attendant frowns and batteries of 
words ! Those sticks and plow-staves so unceremo- 
niously flying about Dutch heads ! That Ever Duck- 
ing with such a hole in his head ! Those frightened 
horses dashing their ' geares in sunder' on the moni- 
tion of a Hartford constable, and the acid Batavian 
stare which must have followed them as they ran ! 
That plow and tackle thrown into the river, with the 
chucklings on one side, and the bewailing remon- 
strances on another which doubtless accompanied 
them into their watery grave ! Those cows, and 
calves, and swine, nabbed and renabbed! Those 
Dutchmen doubtless peering between the logs of the 
Hartford pound after their own dear, dumpy cattle 
and darling porkers! Those Anglo-Saxon farmers 
plowing up to the very nose of the House of Hope, 
and the denunciation of them unquestionably by the 
' fat, somniferous' burghers within, as a " dieven, 
twist-zoekeren, blaes-baken, kakken-bedden" set ! Re- 
ally one may conceive a thousand mirth-moving 
scenes from the facts above given. Commending 
33 



258 HARTFORD. 

them to the fertile imagination of a gentleman in 
this city — of whose superior skill in pictorial illus- 
tration Scseva already possesses signal proof — we 
return to the serious scenes of the subject in hand 
to-day.* How did the dispute we describe progress 
and terminate ? Let us see. 

In the first place then, the entire power of the colo- 
ny of Connecticut was brought to bear on the matter, 
and of course, in behalf of the English Settlers. 
Two messengers, Mr. Weytrough and Mr. Hill, were 
despatched by the Connecticut Governor and Council 
to the Directors and Council of New Amsterdam, to 
urge the rights of Hartford. Their errand was fruit- 
less. It resulted in nothing but a re-discussion of old 
points. But in 1650, when Governor Stuyvesant met 
the Commissioners of the New England colonies at 
Hartford, and various differences were referred for final 
settlement to arbitrators — to Simon Bradstreet and 
Thomas Prince on behalf of the English, and Thom- 
as Willett and George Baxter on behalf of the 



* We have been allowed, here, a chance ourself for a note — and we 
improve it in order to say that the cuts which accompany this volume 
are notable proofs that the hint given in our text, took. Though beautifully 
drawn on wood, and in several important respects improved by the exact 
skill of that excellent Boston artist S. S. Kilbourn, Jr., Esq., yet these cuts all 
had their germ, and in a large part their original delineation, in the fertile brain 
and ingenious hand of our present worthy Editor, W. M. B. Hartley, Esq. — 
to whom we cheerfully committed the task of ushering the First Thirty Years 
of Hartford, in book form, into the presence, and we would fain hope, into 
the heart of an approving Public. For several valuable points, however, in 
the cut which forms the Frontispiece of this volume, the Public is indebted 
to a beautiful picture on the same subject which was painted several years 
ago by Frederick E. Church, Esq., of New York, and which now hangs in the 
Wadsworth Gallery in Hartford. Sc.eva. 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 259 

Dutch — the dispute now under consideration was 
referred among others — and it was determined : 

1. That "the bounds [between Connecticut and New Amster- 
dam] upon the main [were] to begin at the west side of Greenwich 
Bay, being about four miles from Stamford, and so to run a northerly 
line, twenty miles up into the country, and after, as it shall be agreed 
by the two governments of the Dutch and Xewhaven, provided the 
said line come not within ten miles of Hudson's River." 

This award gave the whole of Connecticut west of 
its Great River, with an exception to be immediately 
mentioned, to the English, and ousted forever the 
claim of the Dutch. 

2. That "the Dutch shall hold and enjoy all the lands in Hartford, 
that they are actually possessed of, known and set out by certain marks 
and bounds, and all the remainder of the said land, on both sides of 
Connecticut River, to be and remain to the English there." 

This award shut up the Dutch in Hartford within 
those limits of about twenty-eight acres which we 
have already noticed — took from them all authority, 
or color of authority, to claim beyond their little pent- 
house on the river — and stopped the collisions, and to 
quite an extent lulled the animosities between them 
and the English Settlers, till in 1653, an Act of Se- 
questration, formidable as was ever any Bull from the 
Vatican, closed the difficulty forever. 

Over the North Sea, and through the English Chan- 
nel, at this time reverberated the hostile cannon of 
Blake and Ayscue, and De Ruyter and Tromp, strug- 
gling for the mastery of the seas — struggling the one 
party for national predominance in the Councils of a 



260 HARTFORD. 

neighboring republic, the other for a sovereignty that 
should be independent of foreign control. England 
and Holland were at war. An act of Parliament, in 
consequence, authorized the right honorable Council 
of State to empower the Governments of all English 
colonies to issue commissions to act against the Dutch. 
The Providence Plantations were among the first to 
be thus empowered, and on the twenty-fourth of 
May, 1653, commissioned Captain John Underhill and 
William Dyer — the first as commander-in-chief by 
land, the latter by sea — to seize all Dutch property, 
and treat the Dutch themselves, in every respect, as 
declared enemies to the Commonwealth of England. 
Captain Underhill then resided upon Long Island. 
He was a bold, active, military man. The seizure of 
hostile property, under law and custom, redounded to 
the pecuniary benefit of the chief agent in making it. 
Moved partly by this consideration, partly also by the 
fact that he alone, perhaps, at this time, possessed a 
formal commission to act in the case, and moved also 
partly by the solicitation of friends in Hartford, he 
came to this Town in June, 1653, and in this month 
and year, accompanied by William Whiting and 
John Ingersoll as witnesses, went down to Dutch 
Point, and on the door of the House of Hope, fas- 
tened the following ominous notice : 

" I John Underhill do seize this house and 
land for the State of England, by virtue of 
commission granted by Providence Plantations !" 

Formal, solemn, imperious, sudden, what a conster- 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 261 

nation this Notice must have created ! A bomb shell 
falling in the Fort would not, we think, have caused 
more! Particular too — from some hints we gather 
about it, for all of it is not preserved — particular even 
to the description of metes and bounds, and read by 
Underbill in the ears of the astonished Dutchmen, we 
have no doubt, with true Saxon emphasis, and a man- 
ner and bearing such as became the military represen- 
tative of the high and haughty sovereignty of En- 
gland! The phlegm of the Hollanders must surely 
have been stirred by this, else there is no rigor in 
words, and no impressiveness in the hand of sovereign 
power. The blow was doubtless wholly unexpected. 
There the Dutchmen were, leisurely and lazily smok- 
ing their pipes, and dining on fat salmon from the 
Fresh River, and sleeping soundly, under the protect- 
ing wings of the Arbitration of 1650 — safe, assured, 
careful, more so than ever, in their conduct, thought- 
less entirely of danger — and had been so though the 
war between the mother countries had already lasted 
many months. The General Court of Connecticut 
had not yet moved to dispossess them. They did not 
think that it would. Woful mistake! The Court 
had not yet, in all probability, received its own order 
from England. But nine months, however, had 
passed over the event we have just related, when 
the order came — and thundering on the back of Un- 
derbill's seizure — over-riding and disregarding Un- 
derbill's act as if it had never taken place — the 
General Court of Connecticut, April 6th, 1654 — 
through its own, not through the sovereignty of Prov- 
idence Plantations — by its own, not by authority 



262 HARTFORD. 

derived from any sister colony and delegated to some 
subordinate agent — grasped the possessions of the 
Dutch in Hartford, and held them by its own strong 
hand. Read its Act of Sequestration ! 

" This Courte, considering the order sent over from the Counsell 
of State by authority of parliament of England, that as wee expect 
all due incoridgment, aide and assistance from the said Common- 
wealth of England, soe it is expected that wee should in all cases so 
demeane ourselves against the Dutch as against those that have de- 
clared themselves enemies to the Commonwealth of England, doe 
therefore order and declare, that the Dutch house the Hope, with the 
lands, buildings and fences thereunto belonging, bee hereby sequest- 
ered and reserved, all particular claims or pretended right thereunto 
notwithstanding, in the behalf of the Commonwealth of England, 
till a true tryall may be had of the premises, and in the meantime 
this Courte prohibits all persons whatever from improving of the 
premises by virtue of any former title had, made or given, to them or 
any of them, by any of the Dutch natyon, or any other, without the 
aprobatyon of this Courte, or except it bee by virtue of power and 
order received from them for soe doing ; and whatever rent for any 
part of the premises in any of their hands, it shall not bee disposed 
of but according to what order they shall receive from this Courte, 
or the Magistrates thereof." 

What said the Dutch to this — this locked, bolted, 
barred, and riveted appropriation of their property? 
Well — clearly they could not help themselves — nor, so 
far as appears, did they ever attempt it. We hear 
nothing of them in Hartford subsequently to this time. 
They must have ' left.' Let ' expressive silence muse' 
whatever in their ' praise' it may have in store ! 

What said Captain Underbill — at having his own 
work, by the colonial Act of Sequestration, in fact 
disavowed, and done over a second time ? Well — he 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 263 

clung to his own act as one of ' full force and virtue' 
still — as advantageous, as justified, and as final — and 
on the fifteenth of May, 1655, about two years after 
its occurrence, earnestly, bewailingly even, petitioned 
the General Court for permission to sell the property 
he had seized — setting forth in his petition the author- 
ity under which he had acted, the law or custom un- 
der which he claimed the right to sell the premises, 
his own good services to the country, for a long time 
continued, and his present distress for want of means. 
What said the General Court? Let the following 
extract from its Records answer ! 

May 17, 1655. "This Courte, considering the petition of Capt. 
John Underbill, in reference to his seizure of the Dutch House 
Hope, and lands ; they doe, in way of answer, returne as followeth : 
First, that notwithstanding all that hath yet appeared to them, they 
may and doe declare that till more appcares, they shall maintaine 
theire owne seizure of the premises, according to the end and extent 
thereof. 2n<Uy, that they see not cause to warrant his seizure, 
neither shall they allowe or approve of his sale thereof, to any person 
whatsoever, from this jurisdiction." 

Still, notwithstanding this express installation, by 
the sovereignty of Connecticut, of its own sole agen- 
cy and responsibility in the appropriation of the 
Dutch house and lands, and notwithstanding its ex- 
press repudiation of the intervention of Underbill, the 
latter, July 18th, 1655, two months only after the 
above decree, proceeded to make a sale of the prem- 
ises in question to William Gibbons and Richard 
Lord. The grantees were both Hartford citizens. 
They had each held responsible offices. They were 



264 HARTFORD. 

both distinguished for their probity, their enterprise, 
and their good services to the public. Underhill too 
deserved well of his country. He had defended the 
Fort at Saybrook. He had fought bravely in the Pe- 
quot War. The General Court therefore did not dis- 
turb the sale, but contenting itself with a vindication 
on the record of its own rights in the case, left 
the premises — after a single fruitless effort on the 
part of one Ralph Earle of Rhode Island to obtain 
them, on the ground of alleged prior purchase from 
Underhill — left them to pass down undisturbed into 
the hands of their present owners. 

Undisturbed, we say! By aught, we mean, save 
by the elements ! 

" Earthquakes have raised to heaven the humble vale, 

And gulfs the mountain's mighty mass entombed, 

And where the Atlantic rolls wide continents have bloomed." 

And the mighty Connecticut, Reader — anticlimax 
or not — has swept away every vestige of the island on 
its east side which belonged to the Dutch, and every 
spoonful of the elevated solid ground on which — out 
in the present stream — just at the mouth of Little 
River — the House of Hope was erected. But of this 
House itself one memorial does remain — a single 
hard, brittle Holland brick, of a yellowish hue, which 
the late Sheldon Woodbridge, Esq., of this city, 
some forty years ago, picked up, on the river bank, 
close by the site of the old Fort. Here it is now, on 
our own mantelpiece, side by side — fit company — 
with a large oyster shell which Noah's deluge left, 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 265 

one thousand feet above the level of the sea, on 
the coast of Patagonia. 

The main part of the Dutch Land on the west side 
of the Connecticut, also remains — dwindled it is true, 
on its eastern bound, by the invading river, but the 
bulk of it remains. Would you trace it, Reader? 
Then walk down to a point on the south bank of Lit- 
tle River opposite the southwest corner of the Steam 
Saw Mill. You stand now upon the northwest angle 
of the Dutch property. Now move on, in a straight 
line, to a mere-stone which you will find sunk on the 
north side of the road leading through the South 
Meadow. Thence follow the line of the Meadow 
road south-eastwardly, to a point which is about 
four feet east of Michael Chauncey's Tobacco Shed. 
Thence proceed north-eastwardly, in a line at right 
angles with the road over which you have just passed, 
to the bank of the Connecticut. Thence wind along 
this bank up to the point from which you started. 
You have now perambulated the Dutch Meadow ! 
It's something of a walk — but don't mind that! 
Take breath, and then pass up, a short distance, to 
the present Town Landing on Little River. Stop 
there, and look up stream. You will then see a small 
strip of land, of about one acre, which hugs the water 
on the north — is bounded by a fence on the south — 
by a row of sycamore trees on the west — and by 
yourself on the east. This also was a part of the old 
Dutch property — and as you look south, you will see 
the old road — it is still maintained — over which the 
Dutch used to come from their Fort to the Landing 
34 



266 HARTFORD. 

Place where you now stand, and which they claimed 
as their own. Pass across the river now and over to 
the Steam Planing Mills of Taylor & Company. Go 
about fourteen rods below these Mills and stop. Di- 
rectly across your path now, from river to river, ran 
once a fence, well remembered by many of our pres- 
ent citizens. It was the identical fence which in old 
times separated the Settlers of Hartford from the 
Dutch — and all the land you see before you, environed 
by the two rivers, belonged to the Dutch, as its 
name — Dutch Point — to this day commemorates. 

Take some pleasant time, Reader that art curious, 
that art investigating, that lovest the olden time, 
and perambulate the spot we have now described. 
It is instinct with memories, replete with instruc- 
tion ! It talks to us of our fathers, and of our fath- 
ers' scattered foes.* 

And when you go to the spot, visit also another 
closely connected with it — ah but too closely — of 
which we are now going to speak — the old Burial 
Yard of the Dutchmen of the Fort. Yes, their Buri- 
al Yard — but with no memorial, save bones, to mark 
the spot. It was accidentally discovered. In exca- 
vating ground on the south side of Little River, near- 



*In company with our fellow-townsman, N. Goodwin Esq., we walked 
over the whole Dutch locality — passing an entire afternoon in its ex- 
amination, and most pleasantly indeed! Our companion was as familiar 
with every mete and bound of the spot, as he is with the limits of his 
own door-yard, and with a politeness and kind sympathy in our purpose — 
for which we here do most cordially thank him — pointed them all out to us, 
and at the same time enriched our memory with many interesting facts, in 
relation to the Point, from his own abundant stores. 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 267 

ly opposite the Steam Saw Mill, a few years since, to 
supply earth for the establishment of Messrs. Tracy 
& Fales, many human bones, and several skeletons, 
almost entire, were disinterred — most of which crum- 
bled easily, and wasted away on exposure to the air. 
They had been obviously deposited with care, and in 
the manner of the whites. The place where they 
were buried is at just a suitable and convenient dis- 
tance from the old House of Hope, and is near the 
banks of Little River. It was never in the early 
period of our Town used as a place of sepulture by 
the English inhabitants. It has never, we are confi- 
dent, been so used by them since. The bones were 
not the bones of Indians. The Dutch would natural- 
ly, nay almost of course, considering the hostilities 
between themselves and the English, have a burial 
place of their own. These circumstances satisfy us 
abundantly that they did have one, and that it was 
there where we have now located it. Memorable 
spot then it is indeed ! But it had no ' ponderous 
and marble jaws' to defy the spade, pick-axe, and 
shovel, and so the bones which for two centuries had 
lain there ' quietly inurned,' were tossed, many of 
them, with the cheap earth about them, into carts, 
and 'canonized' or not, were hurried away to mingle 
with the ignoble dust of a car-yard. Ah, Messrs 
Tracy & Fales, were those dead corses ever to ' re- 
visit the glimpses of the moon' what an account 
you would have to render ! The ghost of the royal 
Dane, shaking the disposition 

" With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls," 



268 HARTFORD. 

would be no bugbear in comparison. A few of the 
osseous relics we saved — and bore them off — one skull 
with its occipital wall still standing, a thigh bone, a 
calcis or heel bone, as it seemed to us, and several 
teeth. Trophies indeed ! But " earth to earth, ashes 
to ashes !" They crumbled soon — all save the teeth, 
one of which, without a fracture, solid, polished now 
somewhat from exposure, and looking, stony mat- 
ter that it is, as if it would last forever, is now 
before us. It is none of your long, lank, ill-favored 
incisor teeth — nor the sharp, biting cuspid, or bi- 
cuspid — but a genuine, broad, handsome, amiable 
molar — and molar the third, we think, the dens sapi- 
entice, the wisdom tooth, such as belongs only to 
mature age. Associations crowd upon us! Dark, yet 
white memorializer — gone thy power to triturate, but 
would that thou hadst now a voice ! Fain would we 
apostrophize thee, could we make thee talk ! Steady, 
Pegasus ! "We'll try ! Listen then, old Tooth ! 

Two centuries and more ago, 
Thou in a Dutchman's head wast set, 
With others of thy make and show, 
Batavian pet ! 

Now thou art hard, and free from rust, 
Looking as if thou ne'er would'st die — 
While he, thine owner, is but dust — 
Lone ivory ! 

When bedded in his living gum, 
Had'st thou no pang to teach thee woe, 
That thou should'st thus decay o'ercome, 
To mock him so ? 



DUTCH POINT. ITS HISTORY. 269 

Tell us of aught that he has done — 
Tell us of those to whom allied— 
Tell us if he was quarrelsome 
Before he died. 

Tell us of all that kindred band, 
Which, gathered at its ' House of Hope,' 
In Hartford strove to seize the land, 
And interlope. 

Say if in all around thee now, 
Thou canst one Belgic lineament trace — 
One token that doth not avow 
The Saxon race ? 

Thou'rt silent, molar monitor — 
And useful only to remind, 
That, once, a mouth's mere janitor, 
You served to grind! 

There, Reader! Scaeva, like Bellerophon, on Me- 
dusa's "winged horse! Has he thrown his rider? Judge 
you ! So much for the inspiration of deep night, dark 
death, and the dental relic of a decomposed and 
desiccated Dutchman! Sure Pindus and Helicon had 
graveyards near their fountains, or the Muses would 
never entertain, as they now have for us, 

" The melancholy ghosts of dead renown!" 

We have now, Reader, completed our history of 
Dutch Point — in an article of greater length than 
usual — but which, we trust, you will have found 
worthy of perusal. It is certainly a deeply interesting 
Point to Hartford citizens, and should be to the State 
at large — for it involves, in the early struggles of Con- 
necticut with the Dutch, the fundamental questions 



270 HARTFORD. 

of original title to our whole domain, and of national 
sovereignty. Did our soil belong to England or to 
Holland? Which had the right to make settlements 
here? These great questions were tested, among 
other places, at Hartford, and through the House of 
Hope ! The power of two formidable nations was 
here literally concentrated to a point — and the contest 
resulted, as we have described it, in the triumph of our 
own Father-land. This result was, in our own judg- 
ment, just. It was fully warranted by all the facts 
and circumstances of the case — by the claims of nau- 
tical enterprise — by principles of national law — by the 
high purposes which English settlers upon this conti- 
nent had in view — by their wants, their wishes, and 
by the priceless benefits which their colonization here 
has conferred upon mankind. But for their triumph 
the genius of Europe would never have overspread 
this western empire so magnificently as it has — the 
spirit of the New World never found so lofty and so 
stirring a sphere — the eagle of our own land never 
soared so high to heaven. 

But while we thus unhesitatingly decide in favor of 
the rights of England in the olden time, and exult in 
their supremacy, and in their power, we would not fail 
to award to her great rival the credit which is her due. 
We do not forget that spirit of liberty which from 
time immemorial has animated the sons of Holland, 
and heaped up trophies that vie immortally with those 
of almost every clime. We do not forget her com- 
mercial enterprise, that has vexed every sea, pushed 
discovery to its utmost verge, and been felt on almost 
every shore. We remember, without jealousy, her old 



DUTCH POINT, 



ITS HISTORY, 



271 



maritime supremacy and giant naval strength. We 
recall with pride that industry which walled in her 
millions of people from the terrible power of the 



ocean, 



"And to the stake a struggling country bound" — 



and which made the wind her slave, and transformed 
great lakes to verdant fields, and pervaded almost 
every mechanical sphere, and strewed almost every 
pathway of her social life with the flowers and fruits of 
happiness and of wealth. Sincere she doubtless was 
in her struggle for superiority in the New World — 
sincere in her claim to Connecticut — sincere in her 
efforts to possess and enjoy the lands of Hartford — 
and meritoriously ambitious, we doubt not, of extend- 
ing the domain of commerce, and the might of civili- 
zation — and persevering too. But in this matter jus- 
tice was not at her side — power did not prop her up — 
and her Van Tromp yielded to our Blake. She fell — 
not ignominiously — but fell — and Dutch Point, whose 
history we have recounted to-day, here in our own 
Hartford, will long perpetuate the memory of her past 
greatness, of its decline, and of Anglo-Saxon preem- 



inence. 



SCEVA. 



Slartfar-lL 



THE MUSE AGAIN AT DUTCH POINT. 

No. 25. 
" Taking notes." 



Burns. 



Not Scffiva's Muse again, Reader — no — but one 
far more attractive, that of Mrs. Sigourney. Our 
History of Dutch Point has, it seems, tuned anew the 
chords of this lady's many-stringed lyre — and she 
dedicates to us the strains ! Well — there's no deny- 
ing the fact — it is pleasant to an author to find his lu- 
cubrations thus commemorated — to know that, even 
if not thoughtful himself, he becomes the hint, the 
monitor of thought to others — to feel that though 
dealing, as has been our task, with the faded Past — 
though groping in a crypt which to the common vis- 
ion is darkness and uninviting dust — still there are 
some eyes which have that " precious seeing" before 
which mists roll off from antiquity as from the valley 
around us they roll before the rising sun, and objects 
and events disclose themselves garish in the light of 
day, and rouse to reflection, to emotion, and to the 
joy of poetry. So sees that lady whose Muse has led 
35 



274 HARTFORD. 

her playfully through the scenes described in our last 
Paper. How in harmony with her theme she sings ! 
"We must enshrine her notes — in a chapter by them- 
selves ! This the one — and here they are ! 

SCEVA. 



®f)j ancitnt £)uttf) Burial Ccroimfo, formtrlj at 33uttf) ^oint, 
itlartforlJ. 

DEDICATED TO " SC£VA." 

Who would have thought, in this unresting place, 

Where Toil to Wealth a clamorous tribute yields, 
Such relics of the olden time to trace, 
As digs the sexton, 'mid sepulchral fields! — 
Yet so it is, for antiquarian lore 
Hath won this hidden fact, from History's hoarded store. 

When hither, to yon all-uneultur'd vales, 

Where roam'd the Indian tribes in lordly state, — 
The patient Hollander's exploring sails 

Furl'd the worn wing and pour'd the living freight, — 
Connecticut seem'd churlish at their stay, 
And her strong river rose, to sweep their pride away. 

Their " House of Hope," — a hopeless fortress prov'd, — 

And English eyes with scorn its ramparts view'd; 
Close round its base their grudging ploughshare groov'd, 
While brawl and missile mark'd the border feud ; — 
Van Tassel and Von Twisel storm'd in vain — 
And snatching pipe from mouth, rebuk'd the encroaching train. 

Methinks I see those honest Dutch Mynheers 

'Tween the brown logs, with troubled visage gazing, 
Where their impounded cattle, wild with fears, 
Paid doleful tax for too excursive grazing — 
Meek sheep, or horse, or she with horned head, 
Who fill'd the creamy bowl, that their young children fed. 



THE MUSE AGAIN AT DUTCH POINT. 275 

Few courtesies of neighborhood might grace 

Their Hartford home, or make its annal fair — 
Our pilgrim-fathers had decided ways 
Of signifying what their wishes were ; — 
This was a trait, by Roger Williams learn' d, 
When from the Old Bay State, to Providence he turn'd. 

Xot many lustrums these Batavians bore, 
Colonial hardships in this clime remote ; 
And when their parting pinnace left the shore, 
Loud peals of laughter swell'd the Saxon throat, — 
So toward far Hudson's favoring tide they steer'd, 
Or where New Amsterdam its infant spires uprear'd. 

Yet some remained behind, on pillow cold, 

To sleep the sleep that hath no wakening here ; 
Their Belgic dust hath mingled with this mould, 
And its green herbage drank the mourner's tear: — 
Death to his silent halls a welcome gave, 
And lull'd contending claims in the oblivious grave. 

L. H. S. 



attforth 



ITS MILITARY HISTORY. THE INDIANS. PERIOD 
SECOND. 

No. 26. 

" It is most meet we arm us 'gainst the foe : 
For peace itself should not so dull a kingdom, 
Though war, nor no known quarrel were in question, 
But that defences, musters, preparations, 
Should be maintained, assembled, and collected, 
As were a war in preparation." 

King Henry V. 

" But still the cloud of paganism did blight 
The blossom of their virtues, brooding dark 
With raven pinion o'er the gloomy soul. 

* * # * 

And with the sceptic doubt of modem times, 
The Missionary scaimed." 

Mrs. Sigourney. 

Reader. We paraded the old Train-Band of Hart- 
ford before you once, in front of the State House, and 
up and down Main Street — musketeers and pike- 
men — and described their appointments and their dis- 
cipline — and told you that their's was 

" the bold port, and their's the martial frown, 
And their's the scorn of death in freedom's cause." 



278 



HARTFORD. 



We have no occasion, therefore, to deploy them again, 
or to dwell on the vigor of their arms. The Band 
continued, during the whole of the Second Period, 
organized as during the First, but by a new act of leg- 
islation, all who were unable to provide themselves 
with arms and ammunition were compelled to deposit 
" corn or other merchantable goods" with the Clerk of 
the Band for their purchase, and, alas again for the 
poor bachelors, such of these as had no corn, and no 
goods fit for market, were put out to service, under the 
auspices of a constable, to earn their equipments by 
daily labor. Six times a year, the soldiers were com- 
pelled to train, on penalty of two shillings and six- 
pence for every default to appear, and of two shillings 
for every neglect to attend the commands of officers. 
Twice every year their arms and ammunition were to 
be inspected, and all defects, duly presented to the 
Governor or some of the Magistrates, were to be pun- 
ished, with severity more or less, according to the na- 
ture of the offence. Legislation at this time aimed to 
build up a stalwart militia, and by way of securing 
its efficiency, all chief officers, though chosen by the 
soldiers, were subjected to confirmation by the Partic- 
ular Court, ere they could receive, at the hands of the 
General Court, their martial commissions. 

Two new provisions, at this period, added particu- 
larly to the force of the system in operation — and 
these applied not only to Hartford, but also to Wind- 
sor and to Wethersfield. We refer to the General 
Review, and to the organization of a Troop of Horse. 

The General Review! With what spectacle is 
man, woman, and child in Connecticut more familiar 



ITS MILITARY HISTORY. THE INDIANS. 279 

than with this gaudy, dashing, attractive, annual 
'spread' of the soldiery! On what occasion do pies 
and cakes, gingerbread and crullers, crackers and 
cheese, bread and butter, codfish and herring, cold 
eggs and ham, nuts and apples, hot oysters and coffee, 
pop-beer and lemonade, mead and cider, 'smashers' 
and egg-nog, find such overpowering consumption as 
on the days of General Muster! One hundred and 
ninety-eight years have rolled over the custom, and 
still it remains, alluring, peculiar, fixed as ever — more 
ostentatious in its parade, more motley in its accom- 
paniments, and wilder in its frolic than ever before — 
yet relished by the. soldiery, more even than if they 
played a part at Marengo or Austerlitz — prized by the 
officers as if each of its lines of march were an Areola 
Bridge, over which, amid the flouting of standards, 
and rattling of drums, and peal of musketry, and roar 
of cannon, they were advancing to victory and to 
fame — and thronged with people, who, feeding their 
morbid fancy for 'battle's magnificently stern array,' 
exhilarate the while in spasms of gayety, or become in 
imagination 

" with terror dumb, 
And whisper with white lips — The foe ! They come ! They come !" 

It was first established by the General Court in 
1654 — was to take place, at this period, once in two 
years — and was put under the special superintendence 
of that accomplished soldier and noble patriot, John 
Mason, the chief military officer of Connecticut — and, 
what is worthy of special note by you, citizens of 
Hartford, in its array of military forces, the Train- 



280 HARTFORD. 

Band of Hartford, by deliberate act of the General 
Court, was declared " to have the preeminence of all 
the Companies in the Colony!" 

Three years later, in 1657, and the Troop of Horse 
to which we have alluded, was organized. It was 
made up, not from Hartford alone, but from all three 
towns on the River, Hartford furnishing fourteen men, 
Windsor seventeen, and Wethersfield six — in all 
thirty-seven. Of its seven officers, Hartford supplied 
four, to wit — its Captain, Richard Lord — its Cornet, 
John Allen — its Quarter Master General, Thomas 
Wells, Jr. — and one Corporal, Nicholas Olmstead. 
With these were joined, from Hartford, as Troopers, 
Mr. Wyllys, Jacob Mygatt, Jonathan Gilbert, John 
Stedman, James Steele, Daniel Pratt, Andrew War- 
ner, William Edwards, Richard Fellows, and Robert 
Reive. This squad, as well as the squads in Windsor 
and Wethersfield, were permitted to 'attend' their or- 
dinary exercise within the plantations where the mem- 
bers resided, under command of any cavalry officer in 
the Town, and in union with the Train-Band — but on 
occasion of General Review, they were to appear as 
' one intire Body of Horse.' Fortified with the pow- 
er of filling vacancies in their ranks at the discretion 
of their commissioned officers, and privileged by being 
allowed to draw from the public treasury full remu- 
neration for their horses, if any were killed in battle, 
and by free ferriage across the River at Bissell's ferry, 
in case they went to Springfield, or beyond, these the 
first Troopers of Connecticut held themselves always 
prepared for the exigencies of the country — ready, as 



ITS MILITARY HISTORY. THE INDIANS. 281 

occasion should require, and in time it did, to mount 
in ' hot haste,' and form in the ranks of war. 

The period was one which required, as has been 
suggested in a former Paper, perpetual military watch- 
fulness. Town magazines of powder and shot were 
therefore maintained with great care. Hartford, as 
its own duty, was bound by law to provide, and keep 
constantly on hand, under a penalty of ten shillings a 
month for each defect, two barrels of powder, six 
hundred weight of lead, six score fathoms of match, 
twelve corslets with serviceable pikes to each, twelve 
good firelock muskets, and twelve good backswords 
or cutlasses — and every male person above the age of 
sixteen, magistrate, minister or what not, though ex- 
empt by law from the ordinary duties of training, 
watching and warding, was yet to keep by him, 
always in readiness, under the penalty of five shillings 
a month for each default, half a pound of powder, 
two pounds of serviceable bullets or shot, and two 
fathoms of match to every matchlock. Such were 
the precautions, in the period under consideration, 
imposed by circumstances on Hartford. Such the 
means requisite to preserve its safety and its peace. 
And all this by reason of the Dutch — they were men- 
acing! "By reason" too, says the Law which re- 
quired the preparations, "of the Indians!" 

These Indians — they continued a source of appre- 
hension — at times of vivid alarm. Those at a dis- 
tance from Hartford, the Narragansetts particularly, 
were believed to be ever plotting with the Dutch for 
the extirpation of the English settlements in Con- 
36 



282 HARTFORD. 

necticut — nay there is but little doubt that the two 
parties did combine for this bloody purpose. Those 
near and around Hartford, though ostensibly friendly, 
were yet not to be trusted. Still they pilfered — in 
dwellings, in the fields — everywhere. They still de- 
stroyed swine, seized cattle, and drove off horses. 
They fired buildings. They might murder. They 
did at Farmington. Jealous still of the whites, they 
would readily join, it was supposed, any general com- 
bination against them. They never really liked the 
'pale faces,' nor professed attachment but from dread 
of the Pequot and the Mohawk. The old policy of 
Hartford, therefore, in regard to them, was steadfastly 
maintained. Still they were denied possession of the 
white man's arms. Still they were forbidden, in 
squads, to enter the Town, or singly to be entertained 
or harbored within its limits, and were never to march 
through it in hostile array, nor visit it in the night 
season save on messages of pressing importance to 
the Settlers. Penalties for violating these commands 
were studiously increased during the Second Period, 
and in addition to former precautions it was ordered, 
that no persons should trade with the Indians at or 
about their wigwams, but only at the dwellings of the 
whites, or on board their vessels — that no foreigners 
should trade with them at all — that no one should 
sell, or barter, or give them any dog, small or great — 
that no one should buy of them any timber, candle- 
wood, or trees of any sort — and particularly that no 
persons, under penalty of three years' imprisonment in 
the House of Correction, or of censure from the 
Court, or of fine, or of corporal punishment, should 



ITS MILITARY HISTORY. THE INDIANS. 283 

settle among them, to affiliate with their customs, and 
become dissipated by their vices. 

But while thus careful in protecting their own in- 
terests from savage invasion, the Settlers made every 
attempt in their power to humanize and Christianize 
these sons of the forest. Hartford especially was the 
centre of such efforts. Time and again they appoint- 
ed committees to confer with them, and give them 
good advice — time and again prohibited indiscrimin- 
ate purchases from them, especially of lands, lest 
some unworthy advantage should be taken — and 
strove to soften the wildness of their natures, and 
restrain and repress their vicious usages. And the 
General Court provided fundamentally, 1650, in its 
Code of Laws, that one of the teaching Elders in the 
Churches, with the help of Thomas Stanton of Hart- 
ford, the Interpreter, should be desired, twice at least 
in every year, to go among them, and " endeavor to 
make known to them the Councells of the Lord," that 
thereby they might be drawn " to direct and order all 
their wayes and conversation according to the rule of 
his "Worde." And again in 1654, the Court urged 
John Mynor of Pequot, to come to Hartford, that here 
he might be fitted by Mr. Stone to instruct the Indians. 
It promised to pay for Mynor's education, and for his 
maintenance ; that as interpreter, he might afterwards 
assist the elders, or any other persons, in explaining 
'the things of God' to those 'poore, lost, naked sons 
of Adam,' as it styles the aborigines in the neighbor- 
hood. What success attended these efforts does not 
appear. That they failed, however, in one remarkable 



284 HARTFORD. 

instance, is certain. It was in 1657, and at Hartford, 
that instigated by John Elliot, the Podunk Indians as- 
sembled to listen to the preaching of this famous 
apostle. He addressed them in their own language — 
simply and fervently. He presented them with Christ 
for their Redeemer, and on closing his discourse in- 
quired whether they would accept the proffered boon. 
" No," their chiefs replied, with great scorn and resent- 
ment — " you English have taken away our lands, and 
now you want to make us a race of servants /" 

Little did these natives appreciate the pure motives 
of Elliot, and of those in our own Town who thus 
labored to wash their tawny skins in the water of 
life. Kichtan the Good, far down in the golden 
South West, lured, beyond the white man's God, 
their love — and Hobammocko, Sprite of 111, beyond 
all other dread attraction, commanded the fear of 
their worship. What has become of them — in that 
other world — we cannot but ask ourselves. Axe they 
within the wrench, the garrotte of torment — as mod- 
ern religious eclecticism much teaches — with myri- 
ads of others whose ignorance of the Christian's 
God was not their fault, but was their irremediable 
fate ? Or have they found 

" Behind the cloud-topt hill an humbler heaven, 
Some safer world in depth of woods embraced, 
Some happier island in the watery waste?" 

Answer, Theologian ? Answer, .Humanity ! 

Sceva. 



fartfarfc* 



MARRIAGES AND BIRTHS— PERIOD SECOND. 
No. 27. 

" Take not an husband by report; 

Examine first his head — his heart — 

His conscience — pierce him to the lees ; 

Mark how each joint of his agrees 

And jumps with thine ; for, if they vary, 

The priest, that does your bodies marry, 

But gives a potsherd. In a word, 

If thou canst marry with a bird 

Of thine own feather, haste thee, Jane, 

To render him his rib again." 



" Types, sweet maid, of thee!" 



George Tooke. 



Moore. 



They married — they reproduced — they died! Such 
is the inscription which, so far as the residents of 
Hartford, during its Second Period, are concerned, we 
might write — save for a few chinks through which the 
struggling gaze may enter — on the doors of their hoar 
nuptial chambers, and on the dusky portals of their 
tombs. Jealous, insatiate, hard-hearted Time, that 
thus devours almost all the Past of our Town's affec- 
tions! On thou movest, as if thou hadst a giant's 
stride, notching thy centuries in the eternal rocks, but 



286 HARTFORD. 

forgetting the years, the months, the days, which com- 
plete the circuit of a single generation ! We would 
have had thee mark the smaller increments of thy prog- 
ress through the space in which we fain would trace 
thy flight ! Where, pray, is thy dial of home events, 
oblivious Monarch ? Where the loves thou should'st 
have chronicled — the children o'er whose birth thou 
should'st, for love's sake, have dropt a sunbeam — the 
graves which thou should'st, for sweet memory's ends, 
have consecrated to thy future ? These are all links 
of holy parentage which chain us to the past ! Thou 
breakest them, and then callest us unfilial! Think' st 
thou we take no 'note' of thee but by thy 'loss?' 
Avenge we then by noting but to blame thee ! 

Reflections these, Reader, too sorely pressed on us 
by the waste which Time has made of memorials in 
regard to the marriages, births, and deaths, of those 
who founded Hartford, and who mainly — we say it in 
the just light of history — who mainly founded Con- 
necticut. True our Fathers, as if trusting and believ- 
ing that their descendants would appreciate these me- 
morials as valuable, provided for their due preserva- 
tion. Early as 1640, they made it, by law, the special 
duty of every Magistrate who ' solemnized a mar- 
riage' — and a Magistrate alone at this time, and down 
to 1694, could solemnize it — to " cause a record to be 
entered in Courte of the day and yere thereof." In 
1644 they devolved this duty of recording, not only 
marriages, but births also, upon the Town Clerk, at 
sixpence the entry for the former, and two pence for 
the latter. In 1650 they extended this order, with in- 



MARRIAGES AND BIRTHS. 287 

creased compensation, to deaths also, and with the 
new provision that the Clerk, every year, should pre- 
sent to the Secretary of the Colony a true transcript 
of each entry under a penalty of forty shillings for 
every neglect. But in spite of this penalty — in spite 
of another of five shillings imposed on every newly 
wedded man who did not straightway certify the day 
of his marriage to the Clerk, and in spite also of the 
censure of the Court which, superadded, hung over 
every default, the records, save a few here, and a few 
there, fail us. Moth and rust have, to a great extent, 
corrupted old paper and old ink. The pens of a few 
old scribes, peradventure, forgot to write. The hands 
of some of their immediate descendants, forgot, it may 
be, to clutch. And here we are, wise children — so 
thinking ourselves perhaps — contrary to the adage — 
that know not, most of us, our own fathers, those that 
were such but a few generations back, nor the fair 
maids or matrons, our mothers, whom they married, 
nor a joy or a sorrow of their nuptial life, nor a sun- 
shine or a shadow, a hope or a fear, which warmed or 
darkened over the hours of their dissolution! 

Most of us, we say, are in this predicament as re- 
gards the associations of which we now speak. Dur- 
ing the whole of the Second Period, embracing, be it 
remembered, fourteen years, but fifteen marriages, and 
about sixty births are recorded — and this in a vigorous 
population of probably between seven and eight hun- 
dred souls! There must have been more! The births 
which are registered between 1650 and 1665, and 
those, more numerous, registered soon after — clustered 



288 



HARTFORD. 



as they are thick under single pairs of parents — show- 
abundantly, as straws the way of the wind, that the 
early inhabitants of Hartford were a remarkably pro- 
lific race — that they obeyed no canon of Holy "Writ 
with more pertinacious fidelity than that which en- 
joined them to be fruitful and multiply. There is 
John Allyn, for example, who as soon as he gets mar- 
ried, becomes the father in quick succession, of Anna, 
and Mary, and Margaret, and Rebecca, and Martha, 
and Elizabeth, six daughters 'all in a row.' "What an 
example for a Secretary of State, as he was, to set! 
Then there's Jonathan Gilbert, Custom-Master and 
Grand Marshal of Connecticut, with his Jonathan Jr.* 
and Mary, and Sarah, and Lydia, one son and three 
daughters, all born within six years! And there's 
Sergeant John Stedman, with his John Jr., and his 
Thomas, and Samuel, and Robert and Mary, and 
Elizabeth, four sons and two daughters — just — six in 
all — and each following the other with the nimble reg- 
ularity of little waves! And there's Joseph Smith, 
with his Joseph Jr., and his Samuel, and Ephraim, 
and Lydia, and Simon, and Nathaniel, and another 
Lydia, and on, on — we can not stop to name — till he 
completes fifteen rounds in his own peculiar ladder of 
offspring! Then comes a Merrill family with ten 
children — a Mygatt family with nine — a Pratt, a Stan- 
ley, and an Ensign family, with eight each — and on 
follow the Pitkin, and Seymour, and Wadsivorth, and 
Clark, and Camp families, and others really 'too nu- 
merous to mention,' with their children, each, five, six, 
and seven in number — till it seems at last as if the 
Town Clerk, unable longer to ' keep the reckoning,' or 



MARRIAGES AND BIRTHS. 



289 



fatigued by his task, went to sleep over the lesson of 
Hartford fecundity, and left the Record Book, in de- 
spair, to take care of itself! Seriously, Reader, the 
Fathers of our Town were fathers also of families 
thick almost as 'the leaves of Vallambrosa.' The 
glimpses afforded us through what registry they have 
left, assure us abundantly of this fact. And that mar- 
riages were frequent among them we have also, from 
hints derived here and there, but little doubt. Only 
fifteen however, as already stated, are recorded during 
the Second Period — and these, since they are few in 
number, and may perhaps edify some one in trace of 
genealogies, we may as well re-record here. They are 
as follows: 

Jan. 2, 1650, Anthony Dorchester was married to 
Martha Richards — Jan. 2, 1650, John Rusco to Rebec- 
ca Beebe — 1650, Samuel Fitch to widow Mary Whi- 
ting — April 2, 1651, George Graves to Elizabeth Ven- 
tris— May 27, 1652, Samuel Stebbin to Bethia Hop- 
kins — Oct. 5, 1652, James Walkley to Alice Boosy — 
Feb. 10, 1652, John Savage to Elizabeth Dubbin- 
June 23, 1654, Thomas Wells to widow Hannah Pan- 
try — May 3, 1655, Edward Grannis to Elizabeth An- 
drews — April 20, 1656, Joseph Smith to Lydia Huit — 
7anTl5, 1656, Christopher Crow to Mary Burr — Oct. 
27, 1657, John Church to Sarah Bulkley— Dec. 30, 
1658, Paulus Sahrich to widow Mary Ambeck, [Dutch 
parties, doubtless] — June 2, 1659, Nathaniel Stanley 
to Sarah Boosey — Oct. 22, 1663, David Ensign to 
Mehitable Gunn. 

And now, Reader, let us look awhile at the policy 
37 






290 HARTFORD. 

which in the times of which we speak, governed the 
relation of husband and wife. Here, thank fate, we 
can step out a little into the light. It was a policy 
substantially the same as that we now pursue. It re- 
quired the intention of marriage to be published, as 
we do now. It required that parties, if under control, 
should secure the consent of parents, masters or 
guardians. It established officers to perform the mar- 
riage rites, and demanded that certificates of its per- 
formance should be lodged, as already noticed, for 
record with the Town Clerk. There are two particu- 
lars, however, in which it differed from our modern 
policy, which deserve mention — they are peculiar. 

First. It required that parties who intended mar- 
riage should cause their "purpose of contract" to be 
published, in some public place, or at some public 
meeting, in the town where they dwelt, "at least eight 
days before they entered into such contract whereby 
they engaged themselves each to the other, and that 
they should forbear to join in the marriage covenant 
at least eight days after the said contract." So that 
the mere intention on the part of two lovers to plight 
their faith was to be published — and at least eight 
days before it could be done — and sixteen days before 
it could be carried into effect by actual marriage! 
Odd, odd legislation indeed! No matter how long 
and assiduous devotion may have already been, is the 
interpretation of the law — no matter by how many 
thousand tender colloquies, and little endearments ? 
and tell-tale looks, and betraying sighs, two lovers 
may have already unmasked their hearts, and unmis- 
takeably chained them, for all time, to each other — 



MARRIAGES AND BIRTHS. 291 

still the words of engagement are not to pass their 
lips until eight clays' notice has been given of the pur- 
pose of uttering them! They may wanton with all 
sails set, with all the canvass of all the Cupids, in 
Love's sea of dalliance — the calls constant as the sun- 
set, the walks, the rides, the presents, the electrifying 
pressure of the hand, the fond kiss, the tender em- 
brace, with all these soft 'appliances' they may vivify 
and ripen their intercourse of affection — nay, they 
may even give tongue to their swelling hearts in al- 
most every phrase of passion — their rosy lips may syl- 
able, in tones "sweet and musical as bright Apollo's 
lute," every ' Declaration of love' that Love's ingenu- 
ity can devise — still, they must not engage themselves! 
Still — stubborn, joyless, fruitless task — they must not 
reciprocate the words — "77/ marry you!" The sov- 
ereignty of Connecticut forbids it! Law in its dread 
majesty interposing, sinks like a dense, appalling 
cloud between two idolizing hearts, just at the mo- 
ment when a blissful attraction is about to incorporate 
them into one by the dearest of all mutual promises, 
and darkens them apart — nor does it rise from the 
bliss that it severs, till after eight long revolutions of 
this dull, slow earth upon its grating axis! Oh Cupid, 
Venus, Hymen — god of love, mother of love, divinity 
of marriage! Heard ye ever of such law as this? So 
like attempting to stop an avalanche with a bag of 
sand! Or to arrest a fever with an inch-cake of ice! 
Or to stay a conflagration with a drop of cold water! 
Law so utterly impracticable — for 

" Love knoweth every form of air, 
And every shape of earth !" 



292 HARTFORD. 

Just as if the General Court had eyes which could see 
in the darkness, and pierce through walls of wood or 
brick, and glare in upon every nook and corner where 
the Romeos and Juliets of this world hide them- 
selves — to observe what they are about ! We'll wa- 
ger the bow, and quiver, and helmet, and spear, and 
torch, and butterfly — all together — of that little naked, 
winged infant whom we have just invoked, that the 
lovers of the olden time, in ' courtship's smiling day,' 
in the sweet torrent of their passions swept away 
every trace of constraint, and as lovers do now, 
launched into their contracts to marry — ' popped the 
question' — just when ' the fit was on them' — without 
consulting old Father Time a whit, and regardless, 
most generally, even of place. 

Another peculiarity of the old marriage policy we 
are contemplating was, that it specially forbade the 
intermeddling of third persons, for the purpose of pro- 
curing union between parties who were not at their 
own disposal. Wedlock was a matter, our Fathers 
thought, for an age of fixed discretion, and a state of 
personal independence. " Puppy love" was not in 
odor with them. Little boys and girls, beardless 
youths and misses just out of pantalettes, could not in 
their opinion, make prudent matches. They were too 
unseasoned, too redolent of poetry, too heedless, too 
untempered by time, too fragile in stalk and green in 
the leaf. The clay of their being was not hardened 
enough for double duty. And love — a fire 

" that burns and sparkles 
In man as nat'rally as in charcoals"— 



MARRIAGES AND BIRTHS. 293 

was too often with them, it was thought, a conflagra- 
tion that consumed the practical virtues. Too often 
the product of sheer impulse — " all made of passion, 
and all made of wishes" — it was infatuated, tempestu- 
ous, and a wasting plague. So the Fathers of Hart- 
ford believed — for they state as a special reason for 
the regulation under consideration, and for their nup- 
tial policy in general, that many persons do " intangle 
themselves by rashe and inconsiderate contracts for 
theire future joininge in marriage covenant, to the 
great trouble and griefe of themselves and theire 
friends." And so they discouraged early marriages, 
and would allow no intermeddling to bring them 
about. Your regular match-maker — operating upon 
those who were subordinated to authority, and whose 
very condition, it was thought, implied inability to 
judge wisely for themselves, especially in a matter so 
grave, so responsible, so moulding to temper and char- 
acter, as wedlock — was with them a very grave of- 
fender. Caught — and straightway the General Court 
thundered its own " severe censure" in his trembling 
ears. Such was the penalty, in olden time, for vicari- 
ous nuptial services to the juveniles. Suppose it was 
the penalty now — now when the affections, more than 
ever, have become merchandise in the hands of bar- 
terers — now when Love scarcely uses wings at all, 
but sits, his plumes robbed of ' half their light,' his 
' fields of bliss above' forgotten, sits like a stool 
pigeon, perched in the market of expediency and 
cash — a lure and a prey to the evil brokerage of both 
sexes! What a world of duty our modern Legis- 



294 HARTFORD. 

latures would have to perform, were the old law in 
force now ! Don't you think so, Reader ? 

Yet the regulations, all of which we have now spo- 
ken — however curious they may seem to us — however 
in some respects impracticable perhaps — were still, it 
must be conceded, highly conservative in purpose. 
Discriminating, as they did, between the intention to 
form a matrimonial engagement, the engagement it- 
self, and its official consummation, and interposing 
delays between these different stages of the nuptial 
march — striking, as they did also, at all improvident 
intermeddling with the affairs of the heart — and visit- 
ing disobedience to their mandates, as they did, with 
the ' severe,' formal, superior, dreaded, personal rebuke 
of the General Court — they certainly show a stronger 
disposition than do our present laws, to bridle by a 
high and wise caution the erotic fancies of our race. 
" The prosperity and well being of Commonwealths," 
say the Founders of Connecticut in their recorded 
legislation, " much depend upon the well govern- 
ment and ordering of particular families," and this, 
they add, " cannot be expected where the rules of God 
are neglected in laying the foundation of a family 
state." View of the marriage relation this which is 
elevated indeed! Well were it felt, followed, and 
admired, more than it is, in this our own day and 
generation ! Oh how much less frequently then 
should we hear of ' shadows in love's summer heav- 
en,' of dissension between hearts once fond, and 
of the dark, wild, saddening ruptures of divorce ! 

Sceva. 



cirtfcrK 



DEATHS BETWEEN 1650 AND 1665. REV. S. STONE- 
GOV. HAYNES— GOV. HOPKINS. PERIOD SECOND. 

No. 28. 

" Death is the most remarkable action of human life. It is the Master-day, 
the day that judges all the rest." More's Caiholici. 

" If I were a composer of books, I would compose a register of different 
deaths, with a commentary ; for whoever could teach man how to die, would 
teach him how to live.'' Montaigne 

" Master-day" — aye even so is Death ! Cramping 
life at last into a single startling inch, it flashes a 
judging conscience, like lightning, through the whole 
scarce palpitating mass of human thought, and word, 
and deed — and suddenly all is still ! You are in the 
chamber of another Judgment! To the fold of that 
awful, viewless chamber — in the dread Unknown — 
how many Spirits of Hartford passed, in the time of 
which we speak ? Who died ? How did they die ? 
Could they have taught us ' how to live ?' 

Reader, little is left here for our instruction and re- 
proof — this little, however, we have garnered. 

The Book of our Probate Records, covering the 
twelve years from 1650 down to May 23d, 1662, 
is lost — irrecoverably so, we fear. Deprived of this 



296 HARTFORD.' 

resource then, we have carefully examined old wills 
and inventories. Few of these are left, but enough 
to enable us to add some seventeen to our Dead 
List, making with what we have derived from other 
sources, twenty-eight names in all — a number, how- 
ever, which unquestionably falls far short of the true 
one. Of these names all, save two, are those of 
males, as if in the interval we contemplate, man 
alone was born to die, and woman, fair woman, 
never bit the dust — or as if man only, perhaps, was 
destined to leave even a trace of existence, and 
woman, 'too bright to be lasting,' too insubstantial 
to be clad in the long dresses of memory, were the 
sole prize for Time's ' effacing fingers' — ordained, on 
his ever rolling stream, to be 

" Like snow that falls upon a river, 
A moment seen, then gone forever." 

Be this as it may, the names of but two females 
come down to us from the era on which we now 
dwell, to ' whisper faint echoes' of that far past, and 
' point to earth, and hiss at human pride !' They will 
be found in the List which follows. 

Died in Hartford in May, 1650, John Selden, a young 
son of Thomas Selden. In June, 1651, Lydia, a 
young daughter of Thomas Selden, and Oct. 14th of 
this year, John Wilcox. In 1652, James Cole. In 
1653, Richard Watts, John Pantry and Elizabeth An- 
drews. In 1654, Thomas Olcott, John Hopkins, and 
March 1st of this year Governor John Hay ties. In 
1655, William Gibbons, William Phillips, Thomas Sel- 
den, John Moody, John Pratt, and June 12th of this 



DEATHS BETWEEN 1650 AND 1665. 297 

year Thomas Gridley. In 1657, John Mtynard, and 
in March of this year, in England, Governor Edward 
Hopkins. In 1659, William Andrews. In 1660, Sam- 
uel Smith, an infant. In 1661, Sep. 14th, John Wake- 
man. In 1663, George Steele, Casper Varlett, Deacon 
Edward Stebbing, Capt. Richard Lord, and July 20th 
of this year Rev. Samuel Stone. In 1664, John Arnold 
and Lijdia Smith, an infant. 

Of the above, three from their eminence deserve 
particular notice — Rev. Samuel Stone, Governor John 
Haynes, and Governor Edward Hopkins. They are 
passing away you see, Reader — that first generation 
of the Settlers — the high as well as the humble — to 
the returnless home! Commemorating, as they de- 
serve, the three whom we name, let us with 

" Honor's voice provoke [their] silent dust!" 

Mr. Stone was born at Hartford in England, in the 
year 1602, and was early distinguished for a mind of 
uncommon strength and clearness. A graduate of 
Cambridge University, and a lecturer afterwards, with 
great success, at Towcester, he came to this country 
with Mr. Hooker in 1633, accomplished as a scholar, 
experienced as a preacher, and a devoted Puritan. 
One of the chief agents, as we have had occasion to 
notice, in the purchase of Hartford — the source, in 
compliment to his own birthplace, of its name — he 
devoted himself to its interests with uniform fidelity, 
and uprightness. First chaplain in that first War for 
Connecticut Independence which closed in the flames 
of the Pequot fort, as upon this memorable occasion, 
so ever after in life, his efforts and his prayers were 
38 



298 HARTFORD. 

directed zealously and unaffectedly to the good of his 
new home. 

As a preacher, he was doctrinal and argumentative. 
A great student of theology, and skilled in sacred phi- 
lology, he was an acute and accurate disputant — 
ready upon all occasions, in the august presence of the 
General Court, as he once proposed, or elsewhere, to 
"reason syllogistically, face to face" with any cham- 
pion whom chance or design might throw in his way- 
He seldom used written sermons. His style was ner- 
vous, and he was often eloquent. In applying his 
subject he was brief but pungent, and remarkable for 
" notably digesting in his prayers the doctrine of his 
discourse." It was his custom, on the evening pre- 
ceding Sunday, to deliver in the presence of his fam- 
ily the sermon he intended for the morrow, and he was 
distinguished for his exact observance of the Sabbath, 
and for the frequency of his private devotions. As a 
civilian, he mingled freely in public affairs. Great 
confidence was reposed in his judgment both by the 
Town of Hartford, and by the General Court — and so 
we find him often serving upon important committees, 
and in arbitrations — now conferring with Sowheag in 
a difficulty between that powerful Sachem and the 
people of Wethersfield — now with several laymen as- 
sociated to 'approve' a minister for Middletown — now 
the companion of Winthrop in his voyage to England 
to procure the old Charter, and otherwise variously 
employed as agent for the transaction of public busi- 
ness. As a man, he was amiable, frank, of easy man- 
ners, of winning address, and noted particularly for 
his pleasantry and his wit. It was a keen jester in- 



DEATHS BETWEEN 1650 AND 1665. 



299 



deed that he could not vanquish in repartee. His 
society was sought by all, and especially by men of 
ingenious minds, some of whom visited him for the 
purpose of having doubts satisfactorily resolved, some 
for the purpose simply of garnering up the rich stores 
of his conversation, and some to provoke and enjoy his 
wit. He was a kind husband, a fond father, a pure 
patriot, and one of the sincerest of Christians — so up- 
right, so public-spirited, so full of heart, and full of 
mind, as amply to deserve Mather's eulogy of him as 
" a precious gem laid deep in the foundations of New 
England." Hartford may well be proud of him, and 
remember him with gratitude and veneration! 

He died, as above stated, in 1663, and of a disease 
which destroyed his gall. He seems to have antici- 
pated this event with great composure. In his Will 
he speaks of himself as 'invited and called' to execute 
his last testament "by a gracious visitation and a 
warning from the Lord." He dwells on the fact that 
"through the gentle and tender dealing of the Lord," 
he is "in full and perfect memory" — and premising 
further, with eloquent solemnity, that "all men on 
earth are mortal," that "the time of dying, with the 
manner thereof, is only foreknown and predetermined 
by the Majesty on high," and that it is "a duty in- 
cumbent on all so far forth to set their house in order 
as considerately to determine and dispose of all their 
outward estate, that righteousness and peace, with 
love, may be maintained," he goes on to distribute his 
five hundred and sixty-three pounds worth of property. 
To his son chiefly he gives his library, valued at one 
hundred and twenty-seven pounds, together with half 



300 HARTFORD. 

his 'housing and land' — to his wife and other children, 
four daughters, portions of his remaining estate. To 
his intimate friend the Rev. John Higginson of Salem, 
Massachusetts, he bequeaths his numerous manu- 
scripts, with instructions to select and print such as he 
thinks suitable for the press, and 'especially' his 'cate- 
chism.' Few of these, however, seem ever to have 
been published. With the exception of his " Cate- 
chism" his able and elaborate treatise entitled u a Body 
of Divinity"* his "Discourse about the logical notion 
of a Congregational Church" in which he strikes at 
the system of a national political Church, and his 
" Confutation of the Antinomians" we know of none 
of his works that are extant. They lie in the dust of 
that oblivion which, thanks to chance, does not cover 
his own — for close by the grave of his noble friend 
and coadjutor Mr. Hooker, in the Centre Burying 
Yard, and beneath a plain slab of red sandstone or 
freestone supported by pillars, he lies buried, with the 
following richly merited epitaph upon his tomb : 

" New England's glory, and her radiant crowne, 
Was he who now in softest bed of downe, 
Till glorious resurrection morne appeare, 
Doth safely, sweetly sleepe in Jesus here. 
In nature's solid art, and reasoning well, 
'Tis knowne, beyond compare, he did excell : 
Errors corrupt, by sinnewous dispute, 
He did oppugne, and clearly them confute: 
Above all things he Christ his Lord preferred — 
Hartford, thy richest jewel's here interred." 

*A copy of this, in manuscript, is in the Library of the Connecticut 
Historical Society. 



DEATHS BETWEEN 1650 AND 1665. 



301 



John Haynes* came from England to this country 
in 1633, with Mr. Hooker. Of his history previous to 
this period little is known beyond the fact that he pos- 
sessed an elegant seat, known as Cropford Hall, 
which was situated in the County of Essex, in En- 
gland, and was worth a thousand pounds a year. He 
settled first at Cambridge, Massachusetts, and in 1634 
was chosen one of the Assistants of that Colony, and 
in 1635 its Governor. In 1637 we find him in Hart- 
ford, and chosen this year a member of the General 
Court. He is returned to the same office again in 
1638, and in 1639, under the new Constitution, then 
for the first time put in operation, we find him, as first 
Governor of the Colony of Connecticut, in the pres- 
ence of the assembled freemen, according to the form 
of oath by them prescribed, swearing " by the great 
and ever dreadful name of the ever living God to pro- 
mote the public peace and good within this jurisdic- 
tion." Thus selected to launch the infant govern- 
ment, John Haynes was nearly every alternate year, 
chosen to stand the pilot at its head. Confidence was 
so great in his integrity and capacity, that had not the 
Constitution prevented it, there can be no doubt he 
would have been annually elected to fill the impor- 
tant post of Chief Magistrate. He was also once 
and again appointed one of the Commissioners of the 
United Colonies of New England. He was in fact, 
with Mr. Hooker, the principal author of the Confed- 



* We published full biographical sketches of Governor Haynes and Gov- 
ernor Hopkins, in the Hartford Courants of July 2d and July 4th, 1845. 
From these we have in part condensed in the text. 



302 



HA RTFORD, 



eration of 1643. He seems to have early foreseen the 
importance of this measure to which, under God, the 
New England Colonies, owed especially their safety 
and prosperity, and he pursued it with a zeal and a 
sagacity worthy of the cause. It was emphatically a 
Connecticut measure, and we take a pride in claiming 
it as such. In his public capacity Governor Haynes 
was constantly charged with high and responsible du- 
ties, and often with tasks delicate and difficult — all of 
which he seems to have discharged with accuracy, 
skill, good judgment, and impartiality. His liberality 
in behalf of the Colony knew no bounds. He ex- 
pended freely from his own private fortune whenever 
the public exigencies demanded it. His deportment, 
though always staid, was yet affable and engaging. 
In his domestic relations he was kind and prudent. 
He paid special attention to family government and 
instruction. His piety was eminent, and, what is 
more, he was nobly tolerant in his piety. A senti- 
ment of his is preserved which breathes the true spirit 
of Christian charity, and deserves to be recorded in 
letters of gold. "The most wise God" he said to 
Roger Williams when the latter was once his guest at 
Hartford, "hath provided and cut out this part of his 
world for a refuge and receptacle of all sorts of con- 
sciences .'" Of his deep and sincere attachment to re- 
ligious truth and civil freedom he gave signal proof, 
not only in his willingness to exchange the comforts 
and refinements of Cropford Hall for the trials and 
dangers of a wilderness, but in all the acts of his long 
and useful life. He was in every respect a worthy 



DEATHS BKTAVEEN 1650 AND 1665. 



303 



companion of such men as Hooker, and Stone, and 
Ludlow, and Warham, and Hopkins, and Wyllys, and 
Wolcott, in founding and settling a new Colony, and 
must ever be regarded by all who esteem piety, and 
love freedom, and value efforts in their behalf, as one 
of the eminent fathers of Connecticut. He is buried 
side by side with his friends and companions Mr. 
Hooker and Mr. Stone, and side by side with five of 
his children,- in the Centre Burying Yard. A large 
flat table of reddish stone, supported by four pillars, 
marks the spot, not far from the entrance to the yard. 
"Here lyeth," proceeds the inscription, " the body of 
the Hon. John Haynes, first Governor of the Colony 
of Connecticut in New England, who dyed on the 1st 
of March, 1653-4." With Mather we may believe 
that "as he was a great friend of peace while he 
lived, so at his death he entered into that peace which 
attends the end of the perfect and upright man." 

Edward Hopkins was born near Shrewsbury in En- 
gland, in the year 1600. He was early bred to the 
business of a merchant, in which he became, partic- 
ularly in the trade with Turkey, eminently successful, 
and in London accumulated a large fortune. Coming 
to this country in 1637, on the year succeeding his 
arrival, he joined the settlement in Hartford, and was 
received here with high consideration. His wealth, 
and piety, and business capacity, elevated him at once 
to respect and to office. He was chosen first Secre- 
tary of the Colony, under the new Constitution in 
1639, and the next year was elected Governor of the 
Colony. Between this time and the year 1654 he was 
seven times elevated to this office, alternating usually 



304 



HARTFORD. 



with John Haynes, and frequently filling the office of 
Deputy Governor, when not chosen to the highest 
post. He was also at times chosen Assistant, and 
very frequently one of the Commissioners of the Uni- 
ted Colonies. On the death of his elder brother, in 
1654, he went to England to look after a property 
which there fell to him. His passage out was exceed- 
ingly tempestuous, and once the ship in which he 
sailed was in imminent peril of being destroyed by 
fire. Upon his arrival he was almost immediately 
made Warden of the fleet, a post that had been filled 
by his brother, and afterwards Commissioner of the 
Admiralty and the Navy, and member of Parliament. 
The high appreciation of his talents in England, as 
well as the infirm state of his health, induced him to 
give up the plan of returning again to Connecticut, 
although he had been chosen Governor of the Colony 
during his absence. He accordingly sent from Lon- 
don for his family, who safely arrived. While in En- 
gland he was in many ways serviceable to the Col- 
onies. He printed at his own expense the body of 
laws compiled by the New Haven Colony. . His aid 
and advice were freely given to the agent sent out by 
Connecticut to report to Cromwell the wrongs from 
the Dutch, and to solicit a naval force. He died in 
March, 1657, leaving in his will striking proof of a 
bountiful public spirit, and charitable nature. By this 
will he gave numerous legacies to individuals, and 
nearly his whole estate in New England to pious 
uses, and among the rest that fund, to which we have 
heretofore adverted, which founded and has supported 
the Hartford Grammar School. He was a man fervid 



DEATHS BETWEEN 1650 AND 1065. 



305 



in his religious feelings, and uncommonly exact in his 
religious observances both in public and in private. 
His last words* breathe a spirit of love and resigna- 
tion, and express a pleasing reminiscence of his life in 
Connecticut. To have aided in founding a Colony — 
not for conquest, our fathers thought not of that — nor 
for riches, they had no lust for gold — but for freedom 
and for faith — to have guided an infant State with 
watchfulness and with wisdom for many years — to 
have freely helped its necessities, and the wants of the 
poor, and the wants of the church, from the earnings 
of his own industry and the gifts of fortune — to have 
been ever active and faithful for good, though feeble in 
body from wasting disease — to have been hopeful and 
trustful though sorely tried by domestic affiictionf — 
to have been prudent, generous, dutiful and affection- 
ate — to have looked ever in humility, and prayer, and 
gratitude, to the source of all human strength — such 
is the bead-roll of duties done, and virtues shown, 
which the Spirit of Hopkins had to tell over at the 
Bar of final account. 

Sc^EVA. 



* " How often," said he, "have I pleased myself with thoughts of a joyful 
visit with my father Eaton. I remember with what pleasure he came down 
the street that he might meet me when I came from Hartford to New Haven ; 
but with how much greater pleasure shall we shortly meet one another in 
heaven." 

t His wife was insane. 



39 



gattforlL 



THE SCHOOL. REFLECTIONS. GOOD-BYE. 
PERIOD SECOND. 

No. 29. 

" Where the white school-house, with its daily drill 
Of sunburn'd children, smiles upon the hill." 

Brainard. 

" To point a moral, and adorn a tale." 

Pope. 

" Should it be my lot to go that way again, I may give those that desire it 
an account of what I here am silent about; meantime I bid my Reader fare- 
we ll.» Pilgrim's Progress. 

The School — we must not forget this noblest of 
institutions— this founder of free States — this foun- 
tain of intelligence — this broad, vital, massive pillar of 
true civilization ! Its aspect during the First Period 
of Hartford we have already described. We found it 
then the object of the Settlers' most tender care — 
planted at once, firmly and deeply, with Church and 
State, in the new soil they came to possess. Their 
regard for its support and improvement continued, 
unabated, during the Second Period. Let us see ! 

Ordered, says the Code of 1650, that each Town- 
ship of fifty householders shall maintain a School- 



308 HARTFORD. THE SCHOOL. 

master, and every Town of one hundred household- 
ers shall set up a Grammar School whose Master shall 
be able to fit scholars for the University — and this 
because it is " one project of that old deluder Sathan 
to keep men from a knowledge of the Scriptures," 
and because it is vital that Learning should " not 
be buried in the Grave of our Forefathers !" An 
order this which at once indicates earnest attention 
to education. Satan's particular effort at this time, 
as in 'former times,' was, in the opinion of the 
Settlers, to " perswade them from the use of Tongues, 
so that the true sence and meaning of the originall 
[Scriptures] might bee clouded with false glosses 
of saint-seeming deceivers." They thought that as 
once he sat close by the ear of Eve, 

" Assaying by his devilish art to reach 
The organs of her fancy," 

so at the ears of her descendants in the New World 
he was striving to sit, and forge, out of their ignor- 
ance of Greek, and Latin, and Hebrew, 

"Illusions as he list, phantasms and dreams." 

They did not like his scholarship. They had no confi- 
dence in him as a philologist, nor in his literary pupils 
either, and so they determined that none of their com- 
munity should graduate under his instruction, nor be 
prevented from setting aside that sable curtain which 
the Arch-Deluder was ever attempting to hang over 
the treasures of the Bible. So they -established a 
Grammar School, " to fit scholars for the University" 



REFLECTIONS. GOOD-BYE. 309 

and kept up scrupulously their contributions towards 
a fellowship in Harvard College! 

This School deserves particular notice. It was one, 
as its establishment implies, of a higher order than 
the Common School, but whether united at first with 
this last, or separately kept, does not appear. It early 
received, 16G4, at the hand of Governor Hopkins, a 
legacy of four hundred pounds, in order that ' hopeful 
youths' might be encouraged " in a way of learning, 
for the public service in future times." It has con- 
tinued to the present day. The "Hartford Gram- 
mar School," now in connection with our High 
School, is its lineal descendant. The fund given 
by Governor Hopkins, through the wise management, 
down to 1798, of Town Committees, and since of 
a Board of Trustees, has been increased to twenty 
thousand dollars. The School, in all courtesy, should 
have borne the name of the Governor who endowed 
it I ! In the noble lines addressed by the scholars 
of this Institution to their ancient Benefactor, through 
the truly graceful pen of Mrs. Sigourney, how hearti- 
ly can we all unite ! 

" Patron and Founder, grateful thought doth turn 
Reverently to thee. 

* * * * 

What throngs have drank the waters of the spring 
That thou did'st open here ! 

Wc see them come 
Back through the mists of time. Where now we sport 
They played, with merry shout and flying ball, 
And trundled hoop, or o'er the frozen flood, 
Glided with steel-armed foot. 

A9 now we bend 
O'er Livy's lore, or Homer's glowing page, 



310 HARTFORD. THE SCHOOL. 

Or the long task of figures, without end,— 
They bent, perchance to hide vexation's tear — 
They rose to men. — 

Some from the pulpit spake 
High -words of holy warning, some essayed 
Of jurisprudence the unmeasured toil — 
Some watchful at the couch of wan disease, 
Parried the spoiler's shaft. To giddy youth 
Some, from the teacher's chair, grave precepts dealt, 
Some, 'mid the statesman's perils, rode to fame, — 
And others tested 'mid the risks of trade 
The value of the wisdom gathered here. — 
All were thy debtors. 

Sure these classic walls 
Should ne'er forget thee, but, with honor, grave 
Thy name upon their tablets — for the eye 
Of far posterity." 

While thus nobly founding a school of a higher 
grade, the citizens of Hartford, during its Second 
Period, never forgot the Common School. " A ' bar- 
barisme] they called it, " not to be able perfectly to 
read the Inglish tongue," and know the Capital Laws, 
and be grounded in the rules of religion! And so they 
would for all — rich or poor, high or humble, gifted by 
the God of every soul of us with capacities naturally 
great or small — they would, they did for all, with an 
earnestness noble and constant, provide education — 
now supporting it jointly by the Town and by par- 
ents — now considering "what way may be best for 
the caring and end of a free school" — now demand- 
ing either a little load of wood, or three shillings 
towards procuring it, from each pupil — now hiring 
rooms, as those of John Church, for scholars — now 
appointing Committees "to buy or build a School- 
house" — now appropriating money, as in one in- 



REFLECTIONS. GOOD-BYE. 311 

stance forty pounds at once, towards the erection 
of such a building — and all the while cheerfully tax- 
ing themselves to remunerate Samuel Fitch, and Wil- 
liam Pitkin, and a Mr. Davis, both teacher and 
preacher, who, after Andrews, in their 

"noisy mansion, skilled to rule, 
As village masters taught their little school." 

Nor did their care stop with providing merely 
school-houses and teachers. They made it the spe- 
cial duty of their Selectmen, under a penalty of twen- 
ty shillings, to see that children and apprentices re- 
ceived a proper education, and empowered them, in 
case parents or masters neglected their duty in this 
respect, to take minors, and place them, the boys till 
they were twenty-one, and the girls till they were 
eighteen, under persons who would be faithful to the 
charge of instructing them — that they might be fitted 
for "some honest, lawful labor or employment, and not 
become rude, stubborn and unruly." In addition to 
this, their Selectmen were to see that all masters of 
families catechised their children and servants, once a 
week, 'in the grounds and principles of religion,' or 
caused them to learn some ' short orthodox Catechism,' 
so as to answer questions to their parents or masters, 
or ' to any of the Selectmen.'' How oddly some of 
our modern Town Officers would look discharging 
this last duty! TJiey gravely catechising a bevy of 
our juvenile tyros in divinity ! A sight indeed ! 
****** 

Reader, we are now through with the History of 
Hartford during its Second Period. That antiqua- 



312 HARTFORD. THE SCHOOL. 

rian coach in which, some time ago, we invited you 
to ride, has reached the end of the journey which we 
then proposed. We open the door for you to alight. 
Yet ere you step out, to shake off the dust of travel, 
and to seek repose, pause a moment ! Let us have a 
word at parting! 

We have journeyed, by two stages, through the first 
thirty years of Hartford — that period of its history 
which, when we started, was unexplored, vague, and 
comparatively unknown. A seeming wilderness, 
without a path, when our survey commenced, may 
we not say now — now that we have explored it — now 
that our eyes have rested, minutely even, upon its 
features — now that we have beheld it redeemed and 
disenthralled from savage wildness by the hands of 
civilized and Christian culture — now may we not say 
that we have found it, in all substantial respects, a 
garden of beauty? True it had its weeds — what gar- 
den has not ? But it was laid out with the skilful ex- 
actness of a high moral horticulture. It was seeded 
with the swift germinating principles of true civil and 
religious liberty, and it brought forth fruit, rich, mani- 
fold, both for the generation which first enjoyed it, 
and for all in our Town who have succeeded the rudi- 
mental race. Yes, Hartford may indeed be proud of 
its first estate. Never was there a fairer municipal 
germ than that which Hooker and his illustrious party 
planted here — and rarely a fairer spot for its develop- 
ment than in this our own sweet, laughing, gorgeous, 
hill-guarded valley of the Connecticut! Let our citi- 
zens then — all — rejoice in the good fortune which 



REFLECTIONS, 



GOOD-BYE. 



313 



smiled upon the birth and infancy of their present 
home ! With hearts grateful for the noble institu- 
tions, and the solid liberties, which their Fathers 
established, and which they bequeathed, and which 
have come down To us so perfect, so powerful for 
good, and so full of blessing, let them labor to pre- 
serve them, to give them fresh efficiency, and to 
transmit them, in all their strength, and glow, and 
glory, unimpaired to posterity ! 

While we thus, Reader, exult in the Past of our 
own Town, let us not forget the whole broad sphere, 
in which Hartford, down through more than two 
centuries of progress, has ever played a conspicuous 
part — let us be mindful of all that 



• 



"rough land of earth, and .-tone, and tree, 
Where breathes no castled lord, or cabined slave; 
Where thoughts, and tongues, and hand-, are bold and free, 
And friends will find a welcome, Hies a grave" — 

let us think of the whole of Connecticut ! What we 
have attempted to achieve for our Town in the way 
of giving its story, ought to be achieved for our State 
at large. Time it is that the history of Connecticut: — 
all of it — should be spread before the world. There 
is enough in it to justify the pride of its every son and 
every daughter — and nothing, nothing, in comparison 
with surrounding States, with every State of this 
Union, with every sovereignty the world over, of 
which they need to be ashamed. We are tired of the 
ceaseless ' flings' at Connecticut in which some wit- 
less people, south of our line, choose to indulge. 
They are arrogant, impertinent, and calumnious — and 
40 



314 HARTFORD. THE SCHOOL. 

we would have every man and woman among us, aye 
and child too, ready to meet them — armed and imbued 
so thoroughly with our own history as to be able to 
toss them off as from the thick bosses of a buckler, 
and boldly challenge to the comparison of State glo- 
ries ! We have the authority of Bancroft, the histo- 
rian of our country, for saying, that " no State in the 
world has run a fairer, a happier, or more unsullied ca- 
reer than Connecticut"' 1 — and, he adds, "wo State has 
such motives for publishing- its historical records" 
" The modesty" he says, of those, our citizens, who 
have preceded us, u has left unclaimed much of the glo- 
ry that is our due." Away then with all phrases of 
ridicule at our expense ! Down with the libellers ! If 
they know not more than just enough to talk about 
' wooden nutmegs,' assure them that if we make such 
merchandize, our only customers are strangers to our 
territory ! If ' wooden hams' are upon their lips, give 
them the same answer! If they sneer at ' pedlers,' 
tell them to look at home, and find, if they can, amid 
all of the same vocation among themselves, any who 
have become, as have many from our midst, in New 
York and elsewhere, ' merchant princes !' If they 
mock us for ' Blue Laws,' tell them our legislation is 
as free from intolerance and undue severity as any 
other — nay, tell them that for each stain upon the Code 
of Connecticut, you will engage to point out dozens 
upon their own Codes — and you can do it too — suc- 
cessfully ! Oh such abuse is petty, and detestable — 
and craven the spirit that will endure it ! Put upon 
our pride, let us show, not only that we possess it, but 



REFLECTIONS, 



GOOD-BYE. 



315 



that in the light, and blaze even of our history, we can 
vindicate it, nobly, unanswerably, triumphantly! In 
the presence of those who would attempt to tarnish 
our escutcheon, let us hold our heads high, as heaven ! 

"Back let us toss their treasons to their heads" — 

and teach them that in the gifts of inteDigence, in 
honesty, in patriotism, in all the virtues that render 
life valuable and happy, we bow to no people upon 
the earth ! 

So, with a thought for the pride of our Town and 
State, and with an incentive to watch ever well the 
noble legacy of our Fathers, we are prepared, Reader, 
to bid you adieu. Our journey has been long — longer 
much than we anticipated when we set out. But we 
trust you have found it a pleasant one — entertaining 
and instructive — both. If prosperous with you, our 
own labor is abundantly rewarded. When shall we 
meet again ? Never, perhaps — perhaps ! Life hangs 
so by a thread — thin and brittle at best as the most 
exile fibre of the glass-blower ! Yet — peradventure — 
in the course of the year, we may renew our grasp of 
your friendly hand, and invite you to another ride 
along the mossy, lichen paths of old Time. But not 
until we shall have fully explored another little ' Her- 
culaneum' of history, and garnered, from dusty depos- 
itories and nooks of mould, fresh materials with which 
to prosecute a new journey. The sun shines bright, 
it is true, and inviting, over a continuous path, from 
the Second Volume of the Records of our State, now 
lately given to the public under the promising auspi- 



316 



HARTFORD. 



ces of J. Hammond Trumbull, Esquire. Noble the 
labor he has performed ! Rich the lure it offers 
to our antiquarian thirst! Its treasures may soon 
be our prey. 

Meanwhile, Reader, think, if you please, of that 
which we have already written — of the purposes, 
the struggle, the heart, the mind, the sunshine and 
the shadow, the hope and its fulfillment, of the crowd- 
ed, agitating, adventurous first Thirty years of Hart- 
ford! That these memories may be ' sweet and 
pleasant to your soul,' is the farewell wish of 

Sc^eva. 



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Treatment Date: ^qq - 

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